House committee to tackle resolution to probe drug killings

The House committee on rules will tackle next week a resolution backed by  Liberal Party members to investigate the alleged summary killings in the on-going police operations against illegal drugs.

Majority Leader Rodolfo Fariñas said that House leaders have decided to sit down and discuss the proposed House probe on alleged extrajudicial killings which has polarized members.

“That matter will be taken up in the rules committee meeting next Wednesday,” said Farinas in a text message from Rio de Janeiro as chair of the House special committee to the XXXI Olympics.

Ifugao Rep. Teddy Baguilat of the LP filed House Resolution No. 7 seeking for a House probe on the Philippine National Police’s crackdown on drug lords and pushers which has resulted in more than 1,000 deaths with most of the victims getting killed for allegedly resisting arrest and firing at the police during their apprehension.

While the public has generally cheered the President’s efforts, Baguilat said that some sectors of society were alarmed at the police’s impunity in carrying out its mandate, sometimes at the expense of the rule of law and people’s rights.

Five other LP members—Bataan Rep. Henedina Abad, Negros Oriental Rep. Josie Limkaichong, Bataan Rep. Geraldine Roman‎, Occidental Mindoro Rep. Josephine Sato, and Dingat Islands Rep. Kaka Bag-ao—have also come out with an official statement urging the House leadership to investigate the  police operations because “hundreds of Filipino men and women have been killed among us, many of them unproven drug pushers or addicts, and all of them denied their right to due process or the chance to defend themselves.”

Even the ally of President Duterte, Makabayan bloc, is supporting the public clamor to investigate these killings, said ACT Teachers Rep. Antonio Tinio.

Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez, however, has declared that he would not allow a House probe on the alleged summary killings because this was a police matter that should be investigated by the Department of Justice and National Police Commission.

The Senate committees on justice and human rights and dangerous drugs are scheduled to hold a hearing on Aug. 22 to investigate the recent rampant summary executions of suspected criminals.