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Thursday, June 26, 2003
Spray campaign debate heats up
By Benjamin B. Pulta
A HORNET'S nest has been stirred by former Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim's announcement that the government may decide to revive the controversial "Spray Paint Shame Campaign" as part of the state's anti-drug efforts.
Speaking to reporters, a Supreme Court official, Ismael Khan, Wednesday sided with the government's position and confirmed that there is still no definite ruling from the High Tribunal in connection with the planned resumption of the controversial "spray paint shame campaign" by the government's anti-drug czars led by former Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim.
"While the decision on the case questioning the validity of measure became final, no decision on the merits have been reached," Khan told reporters Wednesday.
Khan, the SC's Deputy Court Administrator said, "It is possible that the defects can be cured" to allow the subsequent adoption of the controversial measure.
At least two civil rights lawyers vowed to go to court to question Lim's policies.
Lawyer Argee Guevarra told the media that the plan "is a direct violation of the rights of the citizens." " It is obvious and patent that he has overstepped the boundaries even if there is no legal basis," he added.
In a statement for members of the media, former Senator Rene A. Saguisag, a member of the lawyers' group Movement for Brotherhood, Integrity and Nationalism, Inc. (MABINI) which worked to outlaw Lim's controversial policy, said: "The shame campaign violated presumption of innocence because it transgresses due process, we cannot tolerate the scarlet letter, yellow star tactics of old."
Earlier in the day, Lim himself said he lost the case on the validity of the policy only because of a technicality since an order requiring him to answer was sent to the City Legal Office of the Manila City Hall in 2001 even though he was no longer mayor at the time.
"The SC sustained the Court of Appeals' ruling declaring default or technicality," SC's Khan pointed out.
In January 2000, the 14th Division of the Court of Appeals (CA) ruled that Lim's spray-painting campaign against suspected drug pushers when he was mayor of Manila was "invalid and unconstitutional."
In the decision penned by Associate Justice Bernardo Abesamis, the Court pointed out how Manila City Ordinance 7926 sought to put red-letter warnings on the houses of residents who have been charged for, but not yet convicted of, peddling prohibited substances.
The CA noted the suspects are "already conclusively considered and unqualifiedly condemned, branded and announced to the whole world, without the benefit of due process, as 'known and/or confirmed' drug lords, drug pushers, drug peddlers or brokers and protectors, gambling lords and protectors."
The Court pointed out that the ordinance was "silent" in cases where the persons whose houses have been marked were cleared of charges, and the "unfair, oppressive and unreasonable" marking sprayed on his house-and his person-were not removed. Lim began the campaign on July 1, 1997 on two hundred squatter houses.
The ordinance that was supposed to pave the way for the campaign was passed by the city council of Manila a month later, on August 6, 1997.
"The so-called Spray Paint Shame Campaign of respondents Lim and Razon oversteps the boundaries of police power, and amounts to invasion and encroachment of the rights of the people without due process," a portion of the original CA ruling on the matter said.
(June 25, 2003 issue)
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