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Melo, Alston reports merit Congress withdrawal of anti-terror law

The leftwing fisherfolk alliance Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (Pamalakaya) and Anakpawis party list on Sunday said the report of Melo Commission and UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston on extra-judicial killings should compel lawmakers to withdraw the passage of Human Security Act of 2007.

“The 86-page report of the Melo Commission and the initial findings of the UN Special Rapporteur on extra-judicial killings attributing almost all cases of political killings of leftwing activists and journalists to armed agents of the state are enough to merit the recall of the anti-terror law,” Pamalakaya and Anakpawis party list said in a joint statement.

Pamalakaya national chair and Anakpawis nominee Fernando Hicap said the Human Security Act of 2007 is a clear piece of shotgun legislation that allows the government or the state to exact state-sponsored terrorism against critics and political rivals of the ruling clique in Malacañang.

“The Melo report and the findings of Alston, despite some shortcomings are clear. The incumbent government has used the military apparatus and powers to silence critics and staunch oppositionists by use of brute force like extra-judicial killings in the name of political survival and narrow political interests under the guise of fighting terrorism,” Hicap asserted.

The shortcomings of the Melo Commission and Alston, according to Hicap, was their failure to establish the fact that the political killings perpetrated by the military was a national policy of the government on anti-insurgency and that there was an existing national pattern governing the conduct of killings.

“The 830 cases of extra-judicial killings and the more than 200 cases of forced disappearances are lucid testimonies that the government had used state sponsored terrorism and political killings to decimate critics and foes of the present administration,” Hicap stressed.

The militant leader said the cases of political killings could reach over 1,000 or 2,000, after another report came out that there were also cases of extra-judicial executions in Sulu and other parts of Mindanao, especially in the areas of Moro people, which were not reported to media but were confirmed by human rights and peace advocates in Mindanao.

The law recently passed by Congress is now awaiting President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s signature before it could be implemented. Yesterday, Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz, said despite the “sharp and mortal fangs of the controversial bill have been removed; doubts still persist about the law.

The outspoken bishop said the bad news about the measure is that it punishes those who bring about “widespread and extraordinary fear among the populace in order to coerce the government to give in to unlawful demand. “ Who decides what is fear and panic, and what makes them extra ordinary or otherwise,” Cruz asked.

Pamalakaya’s Hicap said the report of the Melo Commission and the initial findings of Alston must convince and compel legislators who enacted the Human Security Act of 2007 to call for its withdrawal at the soonest time possible to prevent President Arroyo and the military from using and exploiting the law in furtherance of government bred terrorism.

“ We strongly urge lawmakers of the 13th Session of Congress to recall the Human Security Act of 2007 and instead replace it with a law that would uphold, promote and strengthen basic human rights and civil liberties of the people,” he added.

posted by: GerryCorpuz at 09:44 | link | comments |

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