Is the Philippine government looking to retroactively seek permission for the thousands of tokhang murders committed since the beginning of the present administration?
The House of Representatives voted the other day for the reimposition of the death penalty for heinous crimes.
The proposed Death Penalty Law specifically points to drug-related offenses related to the sale, importation, manufacture, and distribution of dangerous drugs; the maintenance of any establishment where dangerous drugs are used or sold; possession of 10 grams or more of such substances; and certain crimes committed under the influence.
This law also defines heinous crimes as “grievous, odious, and hateful offenses, which by reason of their inherent or manifest wickedness, viciousness, atrocity, and perversity are repugnant and outrageous to the common standards and norms of decency and morality in a just, civilized, and orderly society.”
The specificity of the law as it relates to drugs gives rise to the suspicion that this will be a blanket approval for more extrajudicial killings.
If heinous crimes are to be punished to the fullest extent of the law, why not other similarly “grievous, odious, and hateful” offenses such as murder; vicious, atrocious, and perverse ones such as rape and wife-beating; and the manifestly wicked crime of plunder? The victims of these crimes would certainly describe them as “repugnant and outrageous.”
Why cherry-pick some offenses and not others as worthy of the extreme sanction, unless it is to serve a certain agenda or purpose?
The Philippine Constitution, under Art. III, Section 1, provides: “No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law… Sec. 2: “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses…against unreasonable searchers and seizures of whatever nature and for any purpose shall be inviolable, and no search warrant or warrant of arrest shall issue except without probable cause to be determined personally by the judge…”
Tokhang maneuvers flout due process of law and the right of people to be secure in their persons and houses, even as the police tramp through communities and break doors down to shoot users, who should have been rehabilitated rather than summarily executed, as thousands of them have been and continue to be.
As many have pointed out, it is a war against the poor. How many wealthy and influential drug users have been shot in the streets? Why are the posh residential enclaves spared from tokhang operations? Why haven’t there been any big fish drug dealers put behind bars?
The injustice of EJKs has not gone unnoticed by the international community. The international media have published many in-depth stories that describe the EJKs for what they are—human rights violations. And instead of halting them, is the Lower House paving a way to legitimize them, by way of reinstating capital punishment?
The members of the Lower House should reread Art. XIII of the Constitution, on Social Justice and Human Rights: “Sec. 1: The Congress shall give highest priority to the enactment of measures that protect and enhance the right of all the people to human dignities…”
There is nothing more undignified, and inhumane, and unjust, than to slay a Filipino citizen in cold blood, without due process. And of the innocents killed by mistake, many of them were the flower of Filipino youth, our country’s future. How high will the toll be five years hence?
Moreover, death-dealing is final and cannot be taken back. How sure are the lawmakers that the Death Penalty will not abused to further EJKs? Shouldn’t they first read the research findings that capital punishment is not a sufficient deterrent for crime? Why don’t they evaluate whether this drug war is in fact the right thing to do by our people, given that it has failed in other countries?
As I look at photos of those slain in the name of the drug war, I am reminded of Rev. 6:8: “I looked, and there was a pale horse, and its rider’s name was Death. Hell followed him.”
Dr. Ortuoste is a California-based writer. Follow her on Facebook: Jenny Ortuoste, Twitter: @jennyortuoste, Instagram: @jensdecember