‘Senate OK needed to abrogate pact vs death penalty’

MANILA, Philippines - Fourteen senators believe the Senate should have a say on the termination or abrogation of any treaty or international agreement concurred in by the chamber.

In a move that is seen to affect efforts to revive the death penalty, the 14 senators filed yesterday Resolution 289 expressing the sense of the Senate that the termination of any treaty or international agreement forged with Senate concurrence should not be valid without the chamber’s approval.

The resolution was principally authored by Senate President Pro-Tempore Franklin Drilon and was signed by 13 other senators as co-authors, namely Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III, Minority Leader Ralph Recto, Senators Paolo Benigno Aquino IV, Leila de Lima, Francis
Pangilinan, Risa Hontiveros, Panfilo Lacson, Loren Legarda, Miguel Zuibiri, Gregorio Honasan, Joseph Victor Ejercito, Juan Edgardo Angara and Joel Villanueva.

Drilon said the resolution – if adopted – may have implications on moves in Congress to reimpose the death penalty.

“That (resolution) is a legal position that the 14 senators have taken: that any withdrawal from any treaty should require the concurrence of the Senate. But it is argued by those who oppose the death penalty that in fact, the Philippines cannot withdraw from that Second Protocol,” he said.

Drilon was referring to the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which committed the country not to impose the death penalty.

The protocol and the ICCPR were raised during the first hearing of the Senate committee on justice last week on the proposal to revive the death penalty.

Sen. Richard Gordon, chairman of the panel, suspended further hearings on the bills seeking to reimpose the death penalty until the Department of Justice could come up with clear justification for it without violating the country’s treaty obligations, leading President Duterte to violate the law.

Gordon, Drilon, De Lima and Aquino raised the matter of the country’s treaty obligations as well as the possible repercussions it may face in trade agreements with countries or economic blocs against the death penalty.

They pointed out under the Constitution, international law forms part of the country’s legal obligations.

Senators for and against the bills have also rejected moves in the House of Representatives to water down the proposal to make it more acceptable to lawmakers and the public.

Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez on Saturday said he and members of the super majority in the House have agreed that under their version of the bill, the death penalty will no longer be mandatory and the number of heinous crimes covered will be reduced.

The proposed penalty for heinous crimes would range from life imprisonment to death, and it is the judge who will decide if he will impose capital punishment, Alvarez said.

Lacson, who filed a bill seeking to reimpose the death penalty, said while the House’s plan “may be a good balancing act on the part of the legislature, it is tantamount to passing on the burden to the judiciary.”

“In case that materializes, I might as well insist on my version of the bill, i.e. expanding the covered offenses to include plunder; planting evidence – corresponding to the offense subject of the planted evidence –qualified bribery involving government officials (corresponding to the offense subject of the bribery); most of the heinous crimes covered by the discarded death penalty law like rape that resulted in the death of the victim, including statutory rape,” Lacson said.

Drilon, who is opposing the bill, said Alvarez’s proposal was unconstitutional as a judge cannot have discretion on what penalty to impose.

“Where an aggravating circumstance is proven, such as treachery in a murder case, the judge has no choice but to impose the death penalty. He cannot impose the lower penalty of life imprisonment in such case,” he said.

Pangilinan, who is also against the reimposition, said if the death penalty is left to the judge to decide then it appears there really is no compelling reason for Congress to reimpose the penalty of death as required by the Constitution.

Sotto, who also has filed a bill calling for the death penalty for heinous crimes, described Alvarez’s proposal as “brilliant.”

“That’s the way it should be. Make the death penalty a mere sword of Damocles over the heads of high-level drug dealers,” Sotto said in a text message.

Gordon earlier said senators who oppose the death penalty outnumber those who are in favor of it, but this does not automatically mean that proposals to reimpose capital punishment won’t pass in the Senate.

The senator said he and Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III made a count and came up with 10 senators in favor of the death penalty.

“There are more antis but I’m not sure if they’ll be counted,” Gordon said.

The others against the death penalty are Hontiveros, Antonio Trillanes IV, Francis Escudero, Recto and Pimentel. – With Delon Porcalla, Artemio Dumlao