President Macapagal-Arroyo rejected appeals to spare...

President Macapagal-Arroyo rejected appeals to spare death convicts Roderick Licayan and Roberto Lara this August. "To lick the kidnapping menace, we have to use our legal weapons," she said.
She said that the convicts would be saved only if Congress repeals the Death Penalty Law. Ms. Macapagal-Arroyo noted the moratorium on executions she declared earlier does not cover kidnapping cases. Lawyer Theodore Te, acting campaign coordinator of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), said the President does not want to stop the execution of convicted kidnappers to appease the Chinese-Filipino community, the sector most frequently victimized by kidnap-for-ransom syndicates.
The execution of convicted kidnappers was part of a multi-pronged strategy against kidnapping that the President committed to implement during a dialogue with leaders of the Chinese-Filipino community last year.