Estrada pardon cited in democracy downgrade
By Volt Contreras
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:24:00 01/18/2008
MANILA, Philippines -- The pardon of convicted plunderer and deposed President Joseph Estrada, allegations of high-level corruption, and the killings surrounding the 2007 elections have pulled down the Philippines’ standing in an annual monitor of world democracies.
Citing these developments, New York-based Freedom House counted the Philippines among states that showed a “significant decline” in political rights and civil liberties last year, enough for them to be “disqualified (as an) electoral democracy.”
The group’s annual survey of 193 countries and 15 territories also showed the Philippines still stuck in the category of so-called “partly free” nations.
The Philippines has been in the “partly free” bracket since 2005. This assessment then was disputed by Malacañang, with Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye arguing that “those who say that there is no freedom in the Philippines are out of touch with reality.”
Bunye on Thursday dismissed the Freedom House report as “propaganda” by unseen forces.
“We should be wary of private foreign firms that claim to be expert watchdogs on freedom and democracy. Our people know best,” he said.
But the leader of the militant bloc in the House of Representatives said Freedom House’s downgrading of the Philippine rating as a democracy belied the Arroyo administration’s pretensions of being one.
“Freedom House’s 2008 report removed any remaining pretensions of democracy under Ms Arroyo’s seven-year rule. It is a big black eye on Ms Arroyo’s record on human rights and good governance,” said Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Satur Ocampo, a deputy minority leader.
The number of countries judged free stood at 90, representing 47 percent of the world’s 193 countries, and those considered partly free stood at 60, or 31 percent.
Those found not free accounted for nearly 2.4 billion people, about half of them in China.
Reversals
Reversals in freedom were seen in one-fifth of the world’s countries, including Pakistan, Kenya, Egypt, Nigeria and Venezuela. One country, Mauritania, joined the list of democracies.
Two countries, Thailand and Togo, were upgraded from not free to partly free.
South Asia, the former Soviet Union and the Middle East did particularly poorly, giving “an alarming signal about the development of freedom worldwide, something formerly viewed as inevitable,” said Jennifer Windsor, executive director of Freedom House.
Freedom in retreat
In its 2008 report titled “Freedom in Retreat: Is the Tide Turning?” and released Wednesday, the group said:
“Developments in three countries -- the Philippines, Bangladesh and Kenya -- disqualified them from the electoral democracy list.
“The decline of these countries is significant given their size and the fact that two, the Philippines and Kenya, were previously regarded as important additions to the democratic world and models for Asia and Africa.”
Corruption, killings
For the second consecutive year, it added, “the survey noted a decline in freedom for the Philippines, due to serious, high-level corruption allegations; the pardon of former President Joseph Estrada; and a spike in political killings in the run-up to (the May 2007) legislative elections.”
The group said the country’s “political rights rating declined from 3 to 4” mainly as a result of these factors. The rating system is based on a scale of 1 to 7, with 1 representing the “most free” and 7, the “least free.”
Independent NGO
Freedom House, which calls itself an independent nongovernmental organization that supports the expansion of freedom, has monitored political rights and civil liberties around the world since 1972.
The group defines a “free country” as one where there is “broad scope for open political competition, a climate of respect for civil liberties, significant independent civic life, and independent media.”
A “partly free” country is one where there is “limited respect for political rights and civil liberties.”
Such states also “frequently suffer from an environment of corruption, weak rule of law, ethnic and religious strife, and often a setting in which a single political party enjoys dominance despite the façade of limited pluralism.”
A country that is considered “not free” is one “where basic political rights are absent, and basic civil liberties are widely and systematically denied,” it said.
Elements of electoral democracy
Free countries are those which posted an average of 1 to 2.5 in the rating system; partly free countries, 3 to 5; and not free, 5.5 to 7, according to the group.
In determining whether a country is an “electoral democracy,” Freedom House considered the presence of the following:
• A competitive multi-party political system.
• Universal adult suffrage for all citizens.
• Regularly contested elections conducted in conditions of ballot secrecy and reasonable ballot security.
Massive voter fraud
It also considered whether there was “massive voter fraud that yields results that are unrepresentative of the public will” and whether the political parties had “significant access” to the voters through media and open campaigning.
“A country cannot be listed as an electoral democracy if it reflects the ongoing and overwhelming dominance of a single party or movement over numerous national elections. Nor can a country be an electoral democracy if significant authority for national decisions resides in the hands of an un-elected power (whether a monarch or a foreign or international authority),” the group said in its report.
“A country is removed from the ranks of electoral democracies if its last national election has failed to meet the criteria listed above, or if changes in law significantly erode the public’s possibility for electoral choice,” it added. With Michael Lim Ubac, Norman Bordadora, Inquirer Research and Associated Press
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