Cuenco, a seasoned legislator, authored the passage of numerous laws in the country among them: the Local Government Code (partnered in the Senate by his classmate and ally, Senator Pimentel), the Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002, and the Philippine Baseline Law. He also sponsored the passage of the country’s first anti-terror law then called as the Human Security Act of 2007. He championed its passage parrying opposition by his peers in Congress. CEBUpedia is reproducing his sponsorship, as even up to now it answers the questions of the critics of the new law, The Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020:
(Continued from previous part)
In spite of this deplorable image, we who have crafted this Bill have tried to accommodate those who believe that the period for suspects’ detention without charges should be limited to only three days.
At first the police recommendation was to detain a person without charges for a maximum of 30 days. And I agreed with it.
In the interest of good will, we reduced it to 15 days. And now it has further been reduced to three days. We do not like but we must live and let live.
Compare this three days of detention without charges to that of other countries. In the United States they can detain terrorist suspects indefinitely without charges! In fact Afghan terrorists have been detained in Guantanamo since the Afghanistan invasion without charges!
In Malaysia the period is a draconian two years! In Australia, six months. In Indonesia, 30 days. In Thailand, 30 days. And here, where terrorists are crawling in the south, it is only three days!
We know that this Bill should not endanger human rights from the abuses of law enforcers. But we also know that if this Bill would be able to bite the bullet, or bite the terrorists, it should not be toothless. It should make life for all those beastly terrorists as wretched and as miserable as possible.
This Bill now, Mr. Speaker, is of course only a proposal. Let me say that it welcomes any changes on which we can all agree, in both substance and form.
It may be the subject of addition or deletion or substitution, of rewording or rewriting, or mutual consideration and the art and heart of compromise.
In the final framing of this Bill, we shall listen to individual inputs and bow to the collective wisdom of this Chamber.
The fact is that we must have an Anti-Terrorism Bill that is effective. For something must be done. And the greatest mistake would be to do nothing.
There are those who say that this Bill is directed against the Muslims. Mr. Speaker, this may be due to the Abu Sayyaf, one of the most bestial, most infernal, most demonic groups ever to exist on the surface of the earth. The fact that they are Muslims is only incidental. (To be continued)