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Friday, June 02, 2006
Pooled editorial: AI, CBCP have overlooked killings in countryside
Amnesty International (AI) and the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) have condemned the nationwide spate of killings.
Sun.Star neswpapers are dismayed, however, why the two organizations have mentioned only as victims (1) activists and (2) journalists. They have overlooked the victims of summary executions in the countryside.
How about the crime suspects, most of whom are convicted or accused of petty offenses, who are executed freely, with police not bothering to solve the killings and catch the assassin?
The same savagery and impunity apply, the same illegality and immorality stain society’s fabric.
Victims are defenseless, many slain while asleep or with family, for crimes much smaller than the penalty, without due process, with no court trial and presidential review.
Death toll
There are probably more crime suspects summarily killed in Cebu and Davao for the past two years than the slain activists and journalists put together.
In Cebu alone, since December 2004, there have already been 162 extrajudicial killings, not counting those felled as “collateral damage” — spouses, friends, bystanders — and those murdered by copycats. In Davao, people reportedly have long stopped counting the death toll.
As to value on human life, lives of petty crime suppects cannot be less than lives of activists or journalists. Sins hardly justify the murders. Even the state’s right to kill is questioned by those who believe that it is only God who can take away human life.
Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, archbishop of Cebu and CBCP stalwart, has repeatedly decried the serial executions.
It could be that AI and CBCP pay attention only to the murders publicized by national media. And national media, viewing the murders as parochial, have not reported what is happening in Cebu and Davao.
Institutions eroded
The big story here is not the murders, seen separately, but the totality of the murders, with the killers not accountable for the crimes.
The big story is erosion of institutions such as law and order, criminal justice system, civil liberties, and respect for human life.
If AI and CBCP, along with government leaders, do not see that, there is indeed a lot to worry about these countryside killings. [Sun.Star Cebu]
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (June , 2006 issue)
Write letter to the editor.Click here.
Join the Sun.Star message board.Click here. |
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