Hontiveros to police: Dialog is better than profiling in dealing with Muslim community

MANILA, Philippines — If authorities have law enforcement concerns with the Muslim community, they should cooperate with them instead of resorting to a plan that tags them as “guilty until proven innocent,” Senator Risa Hontiveros said Saturday.

This comes after the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief Maj. Gen. Debold Sinas ordered the scrapping of the Jan. 31 memoranda issued by the Manila Police District to compile a list of Muslim students in Metro Manila after strong opposition of Muslim community leaders.

Philippine National Police chief Gen. Archie Gamboa said that the planned listing was meant to help the police set up dialogs with Muslim youth in threshing out peace and order problems.

Hontiveros said that the scrapped plan screamed of discrimination and was very stigmatizing.

“Maling-mali po yung ganyang profiling, very discriminatory and stigmatizing at mabuti’t tumutol yung mga lider at  komunidad ng mga Pilipinong Muslim dito sa atin,” Hontiveros said in an interview over radio station DWIZ.

(It’s very wrong to conduct profiling, it’s very discriminatory and stigmatizing and it’s good that leaders and Filipino Muslims expressed opposition.)

“Makipag-ugnay naman ng maayos ang ating law enforcement authorities sa ating mga kababayang Muslim kung may mga particular o malawakan man na mga law enforcement concerns, hindi sa ganyang paraan na parang guilty until proven innocent di ba?” Hontiveros added.

(Law enforcement authorities should dialog  with the Muslim community if they have a particular or a big law enforcement concern, unlike that plan that tags them as guilty until proven innocent.)

She later said: “Maging mas pro-active tayo sa mga tugon sa mga ugat ng terrorismo man o criminalidad dito sa ating bansa at huwag mang-discriminate at mang-stigmatize sa kung sino mang mamamayan.”

(We should be pro-active when it comes to responding to the roots of terrorism and crime, and we should never discriminate or stigmatize someone.)

Edited by MUF