Decoding human rights

I was a member of the Commission on Human Rights from 1990 to 1994. My term was short — just four of the regular seven years — because one member, Billy Aportadera, had resigned and I was appointed by President Cory Aquino to fill his unexpired term.

I was a journalist who had reported a lot on the government’s human rights record. I must have been a pain in the ass of my friends in government. But when she appointed me, President Cory said, “You’ve been writing so much about human rights, now you can put your money where your mouth is.”

The 1987 Constitution created the CHR as an “independent office” composed of a chair and four members who must be natural born citizens of the Republic, and a majority of whom shall be members of the bar.  Its mandate is to “investigate, on its own or on complaint by any party, all forms of human rights violations involving civil and political rights.”

Being the only non-lawyer in the five-person commission, I was given the job that didn’t need a law degree — education and information dissemination, which allowed me to engage the military and police and the general public on the mandate of the CHR and the primacy of human rights.

I quickly reconciled with the idea that although the CHR is an independent body tasked to monitor and even investigate government’s compliance with its human rights obligations, we drew our salaries and expenses from government.  President Duterte and Senator Tito Sotto’s demand that the CHR, being a government agency, must not criticize government, especially the president, and their insistence that it also investigate common crimes are simply ignorant, if not disingenuous.  Even the lowliest soldier could understand the need for an independent and focused CHR when we explained it to them. Only those who chose not to understand remained combative.

I was lucky to have served the Commission during President Cory’s and President Ramos’ terms.  Unlike President Duterte, they fully understood the mandate of the CHR and they gave us their unqualified support.  There was no bad mouthing human rights or the members of the commission, no demand for personal loyalties.  And they made no excuses for the violations by some members of the AFP and PNP.

But the AFP and PNP needed to understand the CHR’s reason for being. 

We had to help them understand what human rights are all about.  The United Nations defines human rights as the “rights inherent to all human beings, regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or any other status. Human rights include the right to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, freedom of opinion and expression, the right to work and education, and many more.  Everyone is entitled to these rights, without discrimination.”

For the government, International Human Rights Law lays down its obligations “to act in certain ways or to refrain from certain acts, in order to promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms of individuals or groups.” (UN website)

At the time, the biggest threat to government was the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army.  There were frequent arrests, detentions, and armed clashes, and the CPP-NPA was quick to cry human rights violation, broadcasting this to the world.  The troops were defensive, saying the CHR was biased for the CPP-NPA.

It took some explaining  to make them understand  that while every person is entitled to human rights, as agents of the state, soldiers and policemen act in the name of the state and are bound by the commitments of the state to human rights standards.  Thus, a criminal act allegedly committed by a government official, policeman or soldier in line of duty could be a human rights violation, which comes under the purview of the CHR.  Therefore, the CHR needed to investigate the complaints against them. 

But human rights rules, the uniformed personnel complained, made them fight with one arm tied behind their backs, which wasn’t fair in love and war.  So we talked about rules of engagement that bind all sides in armed conflict under the Geneva Conventions.  The conversations led to discussing torture and “salvaging.”  When we talked about what the proper handling of captured enemy personnel entailed, it became clear that torture was a short-cut to a tedious investigation, and salvaging was the easy way out of a tight situation by captors who went overboard in handling their captives.  Better to execute them than to release a live witness claiming he was tortured.

It was like pulling teeth engaging the officers and their men, but once they understood the nature of human rights obligations, and that the inherent dignity they confer on every person included soldiers and policemen in and out of line of duty, it was possible to talk heart to heart.

Human rights are really easy to understand.  But they require a humanist heart and an open mind to appreciate their value.  As the late Senator Jose W. Diokno, the first chair of the CHR, famously said, “No cause is more worthy than the cause of human rights… they are what makes a man human. Deny them and you deny man’s humanity.”