Amnesty granted cannot be revoked

Tensions have been running high in the Philippines these past few weeks, or to be completely honest, these past few years. For a country that was promised that corruption would be stamped out and that peace and order would be restored, it’s ironic to note that the complete opposite seems to have happened. In the past few years the death toll has increased dramatically, violence is even more prevalent than ever, corruption looks to be at an all time high, prices have skyrocketed, and there is less peace and order than there has been in a very long time.

It’s sad that we have placed ourselves in a position wherein the peso is reaching all new lows and there doesn’t look to be any reprieve in sight. A position where our countrymen can’t even afford the basic goods and necessities they need to survive and where a super typhoon threatens our shores and the lives of countless Filipinos. And instead of being front and center and promoting relief operations, as the government should be, they are instead still arguing amongst themselves.

To be quite frank the song has remained the same and it is getting quite tiresome. There is no synergy in the way politicians work in the Philippines. Let’s face it no one is perfect, and many politicians have made mistakes, but it seems that whenever we elect new officials they are more intent to taking apart what their predecessor built instead of improving on it. Don’t get me wrong – that’s not to say that past mistakes should not be fixed – but the reality is we never seem to be moving forward, we always remain rooted in the past.

Currently what is under contention now is the amnesty of Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV. President Duterte has claimed that the amnesty granted to Trillanes is invalid and has been seeking to have him arrested. When this blew up all over the news (and continues to do so) it felt like 2007 all over again. Is this still where we are? With everything else that is happening are we back to the military uprisings that happened over a decade ago? Does the president truly feel this is where he should channel his energy when so many Filipinos are suffering? The priorities of the current administration are quite mind-boggling.

President Duterte has claimed that Trillanes’ amnesty should be void because Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin signed it instead of the president, at the time Benigno Aquino. Former president Aquino, however, has said that the amnesty process for Trillanes followed the same procedure that all former presidents used including Corazon Aquino, Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada, and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. He said that if this amnesty is seen as invalid then all the amnesty grants by his predecessors should be invalid as well.

However, despite President Duterte’s earlier claims about who signed Trillanes’ amnesty, what appeared on Proclamation No. 527 is that the amnesty was invalid because Trillanes did not apply for amnesty. His application appears to be lost and this was the basis for the president signing the proclamation. However, during his privilege speech in the Senate, Trillanes showed photo and video evidence of him filing the application so now many are wondering why the Department of National Defense can’t seem to find the papers. Former National Security Adviser Jose Almonte said that Trillanes should not be punished solely on the basis that his application can’t be found and that an investigation into the missing papers should commence right away.

There is obviously no love lost between President Duterte and Senator Trillanes. The latter has been quite vocal about his issues with the current Commander-in-Chief and has been pushing, for quite some time, for an investigation into some of the president’s activities like his alleged P2.4 billion bank accounts and the Davao Death Squad. He has not been afraid of calling the president a mass murderer and has not backed down from statements against the administration. Naturally this makes him a prime target as one of the main, and one of the loudest, voices of dissent.

It’s not surprising that the president does not like him, but I feel he has devoted far too much time trying to find ways to get “rid of him.” Does he feel threatened because the senator does not appear to be afraid of him like many others? Although Trillanes is fighting for his legal rights and preserving the amnesty he was granted, he has also said that he is not afraid of being arrested because he is not afraid of the president.

I think that the administration should tread carefully when it comes to pursuing this. At present there seems to be no legal basis for revoking the senator’s amnesty and unless they can prove, legally, that there is a reason to void it then perhaps they should take a step back. I’m hoping we are not heading for a constitutional crisis if the administration continues to push for what they want despite no legal precedence or standing.

In the end, I think it’s more important for the government and for our president to focus on the real problems facing our country and channel his efforts into addressing these instead of going head to head with those who oppose him. We’ve all experienced hard times before but these days it just seems to be getting worse and worse. The government needs to find ways to address the soaring inflation, the crippling rice shortage, and the increase in violent crimes.

If the president really wants to do good things for the Philippines, and I believe that he does, than he needs to let go of all his wild paranoid destabilization fears and get to work. People are angry and they want improvements. There will always be voices of opposition because things aren’t improving, they are only getting worse. If the president really wants to silence his opposition then he needs to focus on what really matters. New strong economic policies and revisiting policies that may not work are what is needed to address untamed inflation, not giving all his attention to would-be “plots” and “conspiracies.”