Party-list lawmaker suggests nationwide martial law

MANILA, Philippines - A Sulu congresswoman wants President Duterte’s martial law not only extended by five months but also expanded as well to cover the entire archipelago.

“I support the President’s request for extension. I also want martial law to be imposed throughout the country,” Shernee Abubakar Tan of party-list group Kusug Tausug told yesterday’s special session of Congress.

The gallery erupted in laughter upon hearing her expanded martial rule proposal. She was the only lawmaker who proposed it.

The late president Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law nationwide in 1972. Former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo imposed it in Maguindanao in 2009, while Duterte proclaimed it in Marawi and the rest of Mindanao last May 23.

Rep. Tan belongs to the Tan political family in Sulu, whose governor is her brother Abdusakur Tan II, who succeeded his father Abdusakur Tan, who also once served as vice governor.

The Tan patriarch does not hold an elective post at present. He lost in 2016 in the regional gubernatorial race in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao to Gov. Mujiv Hataman.

Rep. Tan is one of 245 members of Congress who voted to approve Duterte’s extended martial law proposal. Only 14 voted against it.

In yesterday’s special session, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana allayed fears that the extension of martial law in Mindanao would set the stage for its nationwide imposition.

During the deliberations on Duterte’s request for Congress to extend his declaration of martial law in Mindanao to Dec. 31, Sen. Francis Pangilinan asked Lorenzana about the possibility that a similar proclamation would be issued for Luzon and Visayas.

Pangilinan noted that in Duterte’s letter to Congress, he mentioned the threat posed not only by Maute militants and other extremist groups, but also by the communist New People’s Army (NPA) and other “spoilers of peace.”

“My concern here is that the NPA has been active in Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, if there will be an operational directive, would this mean time will come that he may declare martial law in Luzon and the Visayas?” the senator asked Lorenzana, the martial law administrator.

“That will not happen because martial law is only for Mindanao,” Lorenzana said, adding the military response to NPA attacks is “part of our work in security operations.”

The defense chief was one of the Cabinet and security officials asked by leaders of Congress to face the joint session.

Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon took issue with Duterte’s citing the involvement of illegal drug syndicates and “spoilers of peace” in the “rebellion” as justification for the expansion of martial law.

“Are illegal drugs and peace spoilers linked to the rebellion?” Drilon asked Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea.

The official replied that government troops were able to recover “several volumes of drugs” in houses and buildings retaken from Maute militants.

Medialdea said there was “a way of showing” the link of illegal drug syndicates to the Maute militants but he did not elaborate.

 “With these, where else can we extend it (martial law)?” the senator said. Paolo Romero