Justice long overdue for political prisoners

Nearly 400 political prisoners in 70 jails across the country have been fasting since Dec. 3 demanding justice and their immediate release.  Since Thursday 76 of them, including eight youths, have gone on full hunger strike and 122 others, who are mostly sickly and elderly, joined the fasting. Various organizations and individuals have manifested support through sympathy fasting at a “peace tent” on Chino Roces (Mendiola) Bridge near Malacanang. I joined them yesterday.

They await positive government action on their call for justice, which has long been overdue.

Justice means immediately releasing them as redress for their wrongful and unjust detention. In turn, their release will help preserve and enhance the integrity of the government’s peace negotiations with the National Democratic Front, which President Duterte has repeatedly committed to resume, sustain and complete, and to begin implementing the agreements signed within his six-year term.

Freeing the prisoners will signify government compliance with two of the 12 previously signed agreements, that the two parties reaffirmed in a joint statement on Aug. 26, 2016.  Specifically, one key agreement directly addresses the political prisoners’ rights and welfare. This is the landmark  Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL), signed and approved in 1998. Its implementing mechanism is now being revitalized.

A provision of the CARHRIHL states that the GRP “shall abide by its doctrine laid down in People vs. [Amado V.]Hernandez… and shall forthwith review the cases of all prisoners or detainees who have been charged, detained, or convicted contrary to this doctrine, and shall immediately release them.”  Records collated by human rights alliance Karapatan show that almost all of the 400 political prisoners have been slapped with trumped-up common criminal offenses, instead of political offenses like rebellion or sedition, in violation of the Hernandez doctrine.  (This practice began under the Corazon C. Aquino government.)

Nearly all of those protesting were arrested, detained and maltreated under the Arroyo and Aquino III governments’ vicious and deceitful counterinsurgency programs. Dim prospects for their freedom, however, turned bright after the May 9 elections, when president-elect Duterte proposed the issuance of a presidential amnesty proclamation to enable their early release. 

Duterte made the amnesty offer in a meeting with Fidel V. Agcaoili, then  an emissary of the NDFP peace negotiating panel (he now heads the panel), during which they agreed to resume the long-suspended negotiations. Duterte, a former state prosecutor, waived aside Agcaoili’s request for him to archive the multiple common criminal cases filed against 22 detained NDFP consultants so they could perform their functions in the peace talks.  In August he had 19 of them released temporarily.

In three successive joint statements issued after bilateral talks in Oslo, Norway, the political prisoners’ releases and the proposed general amnesty proclamation were taken up. But the latter two  statements reflected a diminishing enthusiasm and resolve of the GRP panel to fulfill its – and President Duterte’s – commitments on the twin issues.

In October the GRP panel said the draft amnesty proclamation had been endorsed to the Office of the President. Meantime, presidential peace adviser Jesus Dureza tried to explain the delay in the promised prisoner releases. He said; “Necessary legal processes take a while, as cases are within the jurisdiction of the judiciary, an independent and coequal branch [of the executive].” 

Moreover, the prisoner releases and amnesty proclamation got tied up with the issuance by both sides of indefinite unilateral ceasefire declarations in August, with mutual commitments to “develop their separate unilateral ceasefire orders into a single unified bilateral document within 60 days from August 26, 2016.” But as the promised releases and amnesty proclamation appeared  uncertain, no bilateral talks were held on a unified ceasefire document.

Despite the absence of such talks, GRP panel chair Silvestre Bello III issued a statement that a bilateral ceasefire accord would be signed either in late November or early December. But Agcaoili, the NDFP panel chair, denied this, remarking that the GRP panel had been “negotiating with itself.”

Last week Duterte met with Agcaoili, NDFP panel member Benito Tiamzon  and consultant Wilma Tiamzon in Davao. They discussed prisoners’ releases but not a bilateral ceasefire. Yet Bello was reported as claiming that on Monday night the President had given him this instruction: “Produce to me a signed bilateral ceasefire agreement and I will release (the political prisoners) within 48 hours. You can take my word for it.”

However the same news report quoted Duterte as having said Monday night: “They’re [NDFP] asking for the release of 130 political prisoners. I told them, ‘I cannot give you that.’” “I’m sorry,” he added, “but I have already conceded so much on the side of the government.” Nonetheless, he was ready to free sickly and aging political prisoners, declaring: “If they are ready to be released and accepted by their families, I will release them before Christmas. There’s really no point in detaining a person who is old and sickly. It’s a very awkward feeling. I’m uncomfortable with that.”

What can we make out of these conflicting statements? The President, his peace adviser, and chief peace negotiator  should get their act together and align their statements.

One may ask: Why can’t President Duterte release the 130 political prisoners when in the same breath he assures that if the sickly and elderly are ready to be released and accepted by their families – no problem there – he will release them before Christmas?  Hasn’t he been informed that the 130 whom the NDFP wants to be freed on humanitarian grounds are precisely those who are sickly, elderly, long imprisoned, and women?

And if what Dureza was claiming is true – that releasing prisoners can’t be rushed because legal processes in the judiciary “take a while” – how come President Duterte categorically commits to release the political prisoners within 48 hours after he receives a signed bilateral ceasefire agreement?

The issue boils down to: President Duterte needs only to exercise the political will to do what is right – what is just.

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