RESIGNATION OR THE IMPEACHMENT:
THE STATE OF THE NATION UNDER PRES. JOSEPH ESTRADA

By: Atty. Edcel Lagman

 

Whenever Filipinos these days go out of the country and meet foreigners, we are embarrassingly asked about our President, Mr. Joseph Estrada, and his 3 “Ms”; the 3 Ms are money, mansions and mistresses.

There is a different kind of disappearance happening in the Philippines today—it is the disappearance of the people’s confidence in our President and the disappearance of a viable economy. Because of these adverse circumstances, there is a multi-sectoral call in the Philippines for President Estrada to voluntarily disappear; but he is clinging to his position and we are afraid he is dragging our economy to the abyss of political turmoil and economic perdition.

Under our Constitution, there are four (4) circumstances when the Office of the President is vacated:

    1. death of the incumbent;
    2. permanent disability of the occupant of the Office of the President;
    3. removal from office or which is known as impeachment of the incumbent; and
    4. resignation.

These are the four modes under the Constitution.

There are two modes now simultaneously in progress—one is impeachment and the other is resignation. In resignation, it can be a purely personal decision of the incumbent which can be instantaneous or it can be in response to a popular call or demand for the President to resign. While in impeachment, it is a process.
 

In our country, the initiative of the impeachment process is vested in the House of Representatives which is the more popularly elected because they represent smaller districts. The House of Representatives is the sole prosecutor. And once the impeachment case is referred to the Senate, which is the smaller body and traditionally known as the Upper Chamber, the Senate is the sole judge in an impeachment proceeding. In the Philippines, we are in this stage wherein an impeachment case has already been referred to the Senate for trial.

There are several grounds for impeachment in our Constitution. One is for bribery; another is for graft and corruption; third is for betrayal of public trust; the fourth ground is culpable violation of the Constitution; treason; and a catch-all impeachable offense known as other serious crimes.

The President of the Philippines is now facing four counts of bribery with respect to his seeking of payoffs in an illegal numbers game which is known as jueteng in our country; he is also charged with graft and corruption for getting money out of excise taxes; then, also culpable violation of the Constitution with respect to several offenses committed by him; and violation of public trust which includes the construction of mansions for his mistresses.

The other day, the lawyers of the President filed a motion to quash the impeachment complaint on several grounds—contrived grounds—but basically based on technicalities. But as we all know, technicalities cannot be given highest premium than substance. Technicalities are formulated in order to help the dispensation of justice, not to derail or waylay the dispensation of justice. To our minds, the motion to quash is merely to delay the proceedings; because there is limited time for the process since the 11th Congress will be adjoining on May 8 next year. And every day of delay deducts from the calendar. So it is very possible that if the defense can delay the proceedings, then the President can escape conviction by time constraint.

Under our Constitution, the prosecutor is the House, the Senate is the judge. And so, the Senate has no jurisdiction to review or reverse the action taken by the House in initiating an impeachment proceeding.

What is happening now is that if there will be an unfair decision by the Senate, the mass movement, the demonstrations, the call for the President to resign will escalate and the more we will have problems. But similar to our theme today of going against impunity, we are working that the President, the errant leader of the State, should not be given impunity or immunity.

We hope that in the Philippines, there will be a merry Christmas with the resignation and/or conviction of the President. Because if this will not happen, the Christmas spirit will disappear in the Philippines; and what we will have is a Santa Claus who does not bring merriment but merely torment to our country.



 

INVOLUNTARY DISAPPEARANCES IN THE PHILIPPINES
AND PEOPLE’S RESPONSE TO THIS CRUEL PHENOMENON

By: Daisy Valerio
Secretary General
Families of Victims of Involuntary Disappearance (FIND)

Good morning, everybody! Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to share with you some of the realities in line with involuntary disappearances in the Philippines coupled with the people’s response to this cruel phenomenon, a considerable part of which was sparked by the courageous steps of families of the victims, themselves.
 

In this sharing, I have to briefly bring you back to those dark years of Martial Law under then dictator Ferdinand Marcos. As most of us may already know, human rights violations were rampant in our country around this period. The scenario was that in both the cities and in the countryside, people were suddenly abducted, detained and tortured, some were found dead after a day or two, persons, young and old, were suddenly displaced as nearby places or their own communities became battle ground for two warring parties, the government’s military forces and rebel groups particularly the New People’s Army or NPA. The least fortunate suddenly disappeared, most of whom were never heard of again. After a very brief ‘ breather,’ the situation continued during the administration of former president Corazon Aquino and this persisted in the succeeding administrations of former presidents Ramos and Estrada. Although cases of human rights violations were lesser in number during these last two administrations, the fact that the past tens of thousands of human rights violations are not solved up to the present is a continuing human rights violation in itself.

The first families of desaparecidos in the Philippines came to know each other while they were searching for their missing loved ones. We can just imagine how hard their situation must have been as they continued their seemingly endless search. The families went to all areas where the missing could possibly be found. They went to government detention centers, hospitals and even morgues. Meeting each other in these places, the families gradually realized that since they were going through similar predicaments and pains, they also share similar aspirations and dreams. It is in this climate that the setting up of their own organization, the Families of Victims of Involuntary Disappearance (FIND) was eventually conceived.

With their decisive efforts to continuously search for their disappeared loved ones, FIND was founded in the National Capital Region on November 23, 1985 by eight families of desaparecidos. Since then, the organization exerted all efforts to intensify its campaign for justice for the disappeared and their families. Over the years, FIND has gradually developed its six lines of work or programs namely; Organizing and Education, Search and Documentation, Welfare and Rehabilitation, National and International Advocacy, Setting up the Association of the Children of the Disappeared or Samahan ng mga Anak ng Desaparecidos (SAD) and Cooperative-building.

 

From the few members in the mid-‘80s, FIND presently has a total of 732 members organized into nine chapters in different parts of the country – in Western Mindanao, Davao, Northern Mindanao, Negros, Panay, Cebu-Leyte, Bicol, Central Luzon and the National Capital Region. In its continuing efforts in searching for the disappeared, FIND has documented a total of 1,675 cases of involuntary disappearances throughout the country. With the repressed media more particularly during the time of then President Marcos, the organization believes that there are still a lot of undocumented cases of involuntary disappearances especially in far-flung communities so that it continues to reach out to these families.
 

Based on its own experiences, FIND came up with three classifications on the disappeared victims; the first classification are those who surfaced alive after at least 48 hours of disappearance. For instance, in the mid-‘80s and early ‘90s, FIND, together with other human rights organization more particularly the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP), was able to locate disappeared people in the government detention centers in many parts of the country. The second classification includes those who surfaced dead after at least 48 hours of disappearance and the third are those who remain missing up to the present. About 80% of the documented cases of involuntary disappearance in our country belong to this third classification.
 

Indeed, an important part of FIND’s task is to continuously search for the victims, alive or dead even if they disappeared years ago. In line with this, the organization conducted its first successful exhumation on the remains of a victim in 1995. Presently, FIND has already exhumed a total of 35 remains. With the continuous updating of the victims’ documents, we are hopeful that more and more victims will soon be found. In the absence of information, many families continue to hope that their missing loved ones may still be alive. For, indeed, based on the concrete experiences of families, the most difficult part of the situation is for them to remain in the dark on the whereabouts of their missing loved ones.
 

An important development in line with FIND’s campaign for justice is the filing of a bill entitled, An Act Criminalizing Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances in the Philippine House of Congress. This was first filed during the 10th Congress but was not enacted into law within the period. The bill was re-filed in the 11th Congress but again, with the many issues confronting both the Lower House and the Philippine Senate and with the coming national elections next year, there is no indication that the bill will be enacted into law within this Session. Believing that this bill when enacted into law will facilitate the solution of past cases of involuntary disappearance as well as prevent the occurrence of new cases, FIND will exert all efforts to have it re-filed the earliest possible time in the forthcoming congress. Presently, FIND, through the support of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD), is now gathering signatures at home and abroad in support of the bill. Still, another step forward in FIND’s campaign for justice is the filing in court of 14 cases of desaparecidos in Western and Northern Mindanao. The organization believes that the winning of at least one of these cases in court will spark the resolution of other cases.

FIND highly appreciates the initiative of AFAD in sponsoring this very important and interesting “Asian and Latin American Lawyers’ Conference.” Our organization strongly believes that this conference may lead to a big leap in our overall campaign for justice for the disappeared not only in the Philippines but also in Asia and in other parts of the globe where the phenomenon of involuntary disappearance remains to be a glaring reality up to this day. As we exert all our efforts to help resolve past cases of involuntary disappearances, we believe that we are at the same time contributing to the eventual eradication of the phenomenon of involuntary disappearances from the face of the earth. In this light, we can truly say that we are contributing our modest share towards the dawning of a more promising day for us all and especially for tomorrow’s children. Thank you very much!