Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez appealed to lawmakers who are against the death penalty to stop their delaying tactics and let the majority prevail.
In a television interview Wednesday night, Alvarez said these anti-death penalty lawmakers should be more reasonable instead of resorting to delaying tactics.
“Kung ide-delay natin iyan ng ide-delay, huwag namang ganoon. Let’s all be reasonable, we debate extensively, but at the end of the day, kailangang magbotohan tayo,” Alvarez said.
(Let’s not keep on delaying this. Let’s all be reasonable, we debate extensively, but at the end of the day, we have to put it to a vote.)
“That’s the essence of democracy, it is always the majority that prevails,” he added.
House Bill 4727 or the bill seeking to restore capital punishment, reached the House plenary for sponsorship on Wednesday, but it was not debated upon because the session was dedicated to delivering privilege speeches and the quorum was not maintained.
READ: Death penalty bill reaches House plenary
Alvarez said he would leave the fate of the controversial bill to the hands of the majority.
“Ngayon, kung makuha nila yung mayorya, majority pagdating ng botohan, congratulations. Pero kung hindi nila makuha yung majority, well, let us respect the will of the majority,” Alvarez said.
(Now, if the opposition is the majority when it comes to voting, then congratulations to them. But if they don’t, we have to respect the will of the majority.)
The House of Representatives is dominated by a “supermajority” of lawmakers who either aligned themselves with the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte or jumped ship to the ruling political party Partido Demokratikong Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban).
In a press conference on Wednesday, Alvarez bristled at the brewing opposition in the lower house by saying that if they do not want the death penalty, then there should be a shoot-to-kill order against alleged criminals instead.
READ: No death penalty? No problem; just kill the criminals
The bill on Wednesday moved to the plenary for second reading and debates just a few months after it hurdled the committee level in December last year.
READ: Alvarez: Shoot criminals on sight
The bill is seen as a priority legislation in the House of Representatives.
The bill seeks to impose death penalty on more than 20 heinous offenses, such as rape with homicide, kidnapping for ransom and arson with death.
READ: Death penalty ‘priority’ bill of lower house — Umali
Alvarez, Duterte’s staunch ally in the House, was among the authors of the bill after former President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo abolished capital punishment in 2006 for its failure to deter crime.
Alvarez filed the bill pursuant to President Duterte’s campaign promise of returning capital punishment for heinous criminals.
READ: First bill in Congress seeks reinstatement of death penalty
Alvarez’s bill sought to mete out death as punishment for heinous crimes listed under Republic Act 7659, including murder, plunder, rape, kidnapping and serious illegal detention, sale, use and possession of illegal drugs, carnapping (carjacking) with homicide, among others.
In the bill he co-authored with Deputy Speaker Capiz Rep. Fredenil Castro, Alvarez said there is a need to reimpose the death penalty because “the national crime rate has grown to such alarming proportions requiring an all-out offensive against all forms of felonious acts.”
“Philippine society is left with no option but to deal with certain grievous offenders in a manner commensurate to the gravity, perversity, atrociousness and repugnance of their crimes,” according to the bill.
Duterte won the elections on a campaign promise to restore the death penalty by hanging, even making a snide remark that the convict’s head should be severed by hanging. Alvarez said Congress would look into the cheapest way for the death penalty, either by firing squad, lethal injection or by hanging. RAM/rga
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