Filipinos generally are in favour of the death penalty,...
Filipinos generally are in favour of the death penalty, according to most independent polls
Filipinos generally are in favour of the death penalty, according to most independent polls.
Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo says she is sending a message to criminals by re-imposing the death penalty, and has lined up 103 convicted kidnappers for lethal injection, one year after her deposed predecessor Joseph Estrada imposed a moratorium on executions to mark the 2,000th anniversary of the birth of Jesus Christ.
Kidnappers now make up about 10% of the more than 1,000 convicts on death row.Former senator Ernesto Herrera, the principal author of the death penalty law, maintains that Mr Estrada had "made a mistake when he started granting reprieves and commuting death sentences. If we are not going to follow the intent of the death penalty law, then we might as well scrap it. But if we really want to be taken seriously by criminals and potential criminals, we must carry out the law no matter what."
Archbishop Oscar Cruz, a former president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, disagreed.
"It might be good to recall that killing criminals does not necessarily lessen crimes. Right after the execution [of rapists in 1999], the crime of rape continued the next day and thereafter," he said.
Archbishop Cruz argued that with Ms Arroyo's policy reversal, "the president openly surrendered to the reign of crime in the country".
The Catholic Bishops Conference issued a statement urging Ms Arroyo "not to resort to a quick-fix solution", saying:
"It is not the severity of punishment that will deter the commission of crime but the certainty of arrest."
Ms Arroyo said kidnappers were being singled out "because of the gravity of the crime and how widespread it is, and the impact that it has beyond the victims themselves". The plan is doubly controversial because executing all 103 convicted kidnappers would call for the annulment of the commuted sentences of six convicts - one of whom was reprieved by Arroyo herself. The others won their commutation from Estrada.
The Free Legal Assistance Group, a volunteer lawyers' organisation whose members serve as lawyers for some of the death row convicts, warned that recalling commutation orders would be unprecedented and unconstitutional.
"Government cannot legally put to death convicts who are no longer sentenced to death," group secretary-general Socorro Diokno said.
Theodore Te, a group lawyer who represented the first convict executed under the Estrada government, warned that this could "theoretically" be grounds for her impeachment.
Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo says she is sending a message to criminals by re-imposing the death penalty, and has lined up 103 convicted kidnappers for lethal injection, one year after her deposed predecessor Joseph Estrada imposed a moratorium on executions to mark the 2,000th anniversary of the birth of Jesus Christ.
Kidnappers now make up about 10% of the more than 1,000 convicts on death row.Former senator Ernesto Herrera, the principal author of the death penalty law, maintains that Mr Estrada had "made a mistake when he started granting reprieves and commuting death sentences. If we are not going to follow the intent of the death penalty law, then we might as well scrap it. But if we really want to be taken seriously by criminals and potential criminals, we must carry out the law no matter what."
Archbishop Oscar Cruz, a former president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, disagreed.
"It might be good to recall that killing criminals does not necessarily lessen crimes. Right after the execution [of rapists in 1999], the crime of rape continued the next day and thereafter," he said.
Archbishop Cruz argued that with Ms Arroyo's policy reversal, "the president openly surrendered to the reign of crime in the country".
The Catholic Bishops Conference issued a statement urging Ms Arroyo "not to resort to a quick-fix solution", saying:
"It is not the severity of punishment that will deter the commission of crime but the certainty of arrest."
Ms Arroyo said kidnappers were being singled out "because of the gravity of the crime and how widespread it is, and the impact that it has beyond the victims themselves". The plan is doubly controversial because executing all 103 convicted kidnappers would call for the annulment of the commuted sentences of six convicts - one of whom was reprieved by Arroyo herself. The others won their commutation from Estrada.
The Free Legal Assistance Group, a volunteer lawyers' organisation whose members serve as lawyers for some of the death row convicts, warned that recalling commutation orders would be unprecedented and unconstitutional.
"Government cannot legally put to death convicts who are no longer sentenced to death," group secretary-general Socorro Diokno said.
Theodore Te, a group lawyer who represented the first convict executed under the Estrada government, warned that this could "theoretically" be grounds for her impeachment.
— SOURCES
- (Sources: Bangkok Post, 29/10/2001)