House no longer seeking death penalty for violations of anti-terror law

The House of Representatives has dropped the proposal to impose the death penalty for violations of the country’s anti-terror law or the Human Security Act of 2007.

“The imposition of the death penalty is violative of the Constitution. Thus, all penalties imposing ‘death’ in the bill have been deleted,” read the marginal note of the working draft of the yet-unnumbered substitute bill.

The new bill only retained the proposal of the author, Pangasinan 5th Dist. Rep. Amado Espino Jr., to make the violations of the Human Security Act punishable by life imprisonment, not the death penalty.

In deciding to do away with the death penalty clause, the technical working group  (TWG) of the House committees on public order and national defense cited the objection of the Departments of Justice and National Defense.

Fears about Espino’s bill

However, Espino’s bill, which proposes major revisions to the Human Security Act of 2007 and seeks to retitle it as the “Prevention of Terrorism Act,” continued to fuel fears of human rights violations.

The bill would change the motive of terrorism to refer to attempts to “compel a government, an international organization or any person or entity to do or to abstain from doing any act.”

This definition is broader than the current law’s requirement to prove that the aim was to “coerce the government to give in to an unlawful demand.”

Espino’s bill will also make it enough for authorities to conduct surveillance on individuals merely on the “reasonable ground of suspicion on the part of the law enforcement or military personnel.”

This would be less strict than the current requirement for authorities to prove “probable cause… based on personal knowledge.”

Espino’s bill also sought the repeal of various provisions safeguarding the rights of detainees, requiring an official custodial logbook, prohibiting torture during investigation and interrogation, and penalizing the violations of these provisions.

It also sought the repeal of provisions mandating a speedy trial, barring a separate prosecution for a terrorism-related felony, granting damages to persons acquitted of terrorism charges, recording the name and address of informants, defining the role of the Commission on Human Rights, and creating a grievance committee.

The bill would extend to 30 working days—from the current three calendar days—the period when a person may be detained without an arrest warrant.

Suspects could be detained without warrant for committing any of the predicate crimes—piracy, rebellion, coup d’etat, murder, kidnapping, crimes involving destruction, arson, hijacking, piracy, trafficking, cybercrime, or violations of the laws against drugs or toxic substances—and not necessarily the crime of terrorism itself, like what the current law states.

The bill would also delete the requirement for such law enforcers or soldiers to secure a written authorization from the Anti-Terrorism Council before detaining suspects without warrant.

In cases of an actual or imminent terrorist attack, suspects “may be detained for more than 30 days” without written approval—certainly longer than the current limit of three days.

The bill would also prolong the period of the preliminary asset preservation order (freeze order) to six months from the current 24 hours. It would also lengthen state surveillance to 90 days, from the current 30.

Terrorist acts would be punishable with life imprisonment.

Wholesale disregard of rights

During a Monday hearing by the TWG, Cristina Palabay, secretary-general of human rights group Karapatan, said the draft bill would “enable the wholesale disregard of human and people’s rights enshrined in the 1987 Constitution.”

Palabay said the proposal to lower the standards for state surveillance was “very dangerous,” because it “implies that anyone can be arbitrarily proscribed and considered as a ‘terrorist’” upon mere suspicion.

She also questioned the provision allowing the Department of Justice to file an ex-parte (unilateral) application for a freeze order on the assets of suspected terrorists without requiring the suspect to be heard.

“This means, a suspect, not yet convicted of a crime, loses his freedom and his material wealth, if any, as soon as one is proscribed as a terrorist,” she said.

For Palabay, the repeal of safeguards of detainee rights would be tantamount to “the explicit approval and promotion of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment during the arbitrary or illegal detention of an accused individual.”

Palabay questioned the inclusion of drug violations among the terrorist acts, because it would “make the already bloody drug war even more brutal and detrimental to people’s rights.”

She also described as “overbroad” the expanded definition of terrorist acts to include “any act other act intended to cause” death, risk to the public health and safety, or damage to critical infrastructure.

She also zeroed in on the deletion of a vital phrase—“The State shall uphold the basic rights and fundamental liberties of the people as enshrined in the Constitution”—from the declaration of policy in the draft substitute bill.

“Lest this roll-out of repressive legislation and the dismal human rights situation are reversed, the view that the State is the primary purveyor of terrorism will remain in the eyes of the victims of rights violations,” she said.

Against dissent

Meanwhile, Bayan Muna chairperson and former Rep. Neri Colmenares told lawmakers that “the general definitions alone would kill our democratic rights [and] dissent will die.”

Colmenares said the proposals were not aimed at extremists like the Abu Sayyaf Group or the Maute Group, arguing the current laws already empower authorities to act against such groups.

He said the amendments were meant to curtail the right to express grievances against the government.

“They need these new sets of laws for other kinds of threats deemed by the government and that is the opposition and the dissenters and those who are against the policies of the government,” he added.

Suara Bangsamoro spokesperson Jerome Succor Aba said the inclusion of common crimes among the terrorist acts was meant to enable authorities to file “trumped-up” terrorism charges against civil society organizations.

Raymund Villanueva, deputy secretary-general of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, questioned if the inserted provisions that would penalize the “incitement” and “glorification” of terrorism would be used against the press.

“Will this provision be used or abused by state forces or harass and charge members of the press, misconstruing such as glorification [of terrorism]?” Villanueva asked.  /vvp