Trillanes files bill for stiffer penalties vs human traffickers

MANILA, Philippines – Senator Antonio Trillanes wants stiffer penalties against government personnel involved in human trafficking.

From the existing 20 years of jail time, Trillanes filed a bill to raise the penalty to 25 years against human trafficking offenders “who are working in government and who are engaged in illegal labor, sex and child trafficking.”

“The act of a government official or employee who involves themselves in human trafficking is clearly one of the highest forms of betrayal of public trust,” he said in a statement on Monday.

“Hence, there is a need to impose stiffer penalties upon these types of offenders” he added.

While he recognized that Republic Act No. 9208 otherwise known as the ‘Anti-Trafficking in Persons
Act of 2003 was aimed at protecting the people especially women and children from human trafficking and forced labor and servitude, Trillanes pointed out that a pressing need “to provide stiffer penalties against certain persons, particularly government officials and employees, who are engaged in human trafficking to stem the occurrence of these anomalous acts.”

The senator also wants to amend Section 7 of the R.A. 9208 to strike out the confidentiality provision that protects those who are charged of human trafficking in the same way it protects victims of the offense.

“The fight against human trafficking is being unduly hampered by Section 7 which restricts the dissemination of information relating to people charged with trafficking,” Trillanes said.

“Lifting the confidentiality provision in favor of the alleged perpetrators would enable the government as well as concerned non-government organizations and the media to disseminate vital information in order to forewarn the public from being victimized by persons and syndicates engaged in this nefarious trade,” he said.

Senate Bill No. 2625, principally authored by Trillanes, also calls for the creation of a permanent secretariat for the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT) to manage the council’s activities and to provide for the continuity of plans and programs.

The bill likewise provides for direct funding for the IACAT’s Secretariat to support it in fulfilling its mandate instead of just being merely allowed to tap a trust fund, which hardly meets the financial requirements of victims of human trafficking needing assistance.

The fines, proceeds and properties forfeited from people convicted of human trafficking are supposed to be placed in the said trust fund, in accordance with the existing law.

“Considering the growing number of human trafficking cases and the number of victims who need the support and assistance of IACAT, this mode of funding hardly meets the challenges of the times,” said the senator, noting that funds from the fines and forfeitures were slow in coming and “we see no significant increase in the rate of the accumulation of said fund in the near future.”

“Let us ‘put our money where our mouth is’ by providing direct funding for the IACAT Secretariat, whose primary function is to coordinate efforts intended to protect our Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) or our bagong bayani (new heroes) as we call them, as well as our women and children,” he said.

Trillanes then urged his colleagues in the House of Representatives to pass a counterpart measure “to make the fight against human trafficking more effective and more responsive to the demands of the times.”