This story
was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly
newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. V, No. 34, October 2-8, 2005
GMA Creating ‘De Facto
Dictatorship’ – Ex-PCGG Commissioner A
former commissioner of the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG)
said over the weekend that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is creating a
“de facto dictatorship.” She cited the calibrated preemptive response
policy and EO 464 as “repressive acts,” and said that the anti-terrorism bill (ATB)
and Charter change could lead to heightened repression. BY
ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
A former
commissioner of the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) who is
also a law professor at the University of the Philippines (UP) said over the
weekend that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is creating a “de facto
dictatorship.”
In a forum
organized Sept. 30 by the broad-based Artists for Democracy and the Immediate
Ouster of Gloria (ADIOS Gloria), lawyer Vicky Avena described the Arroyo
administration’s calibrated preemptive response policy and the recently-issued
Executive Order No. 464, which prohibits public officers from testifying in
congressional investigations without permission from the President, as
“repressive acts.” She also said that the anti-terrorism bill (ATB) and Charter
change could worsen the scenario of repression which she said is already taking
shape.
Arroyo, long
opposed by cause-oriented groups for what they describe as her government’s
imposition of “anti-national and anti-people” policies, has lately been facing
intensifying calls for her resignation or removal from Malacañang following
renewed allegations that she cheated her way to victory in the 2004 election.
Calibrated
preemptive response
The government has
recently enforced the calibrated preemptive response policy, which entails a
strict implementation of the no permit, no rally policy provided for by Batas
Pambansa Blg. 880, in the wake of a series of rallies calling for Arroyo’s
resignation or removal from office. BP 880, signed into law in 1985 by then
President Ferdinand Marcos, requires protesters to apply for rally permits
before being allowed to hold demonstrations.
“BP 880 does not
give a blanket prohibition on rallies,” Avena, who is also a convenor of the
Counsels for the Defense of Liberties (Codal), said in a subsequent interview
with Bulatlat. “If there are impositions or restrictions readily
available or they can lay down, they will give the permit anyway, although they
make it difficult for protesters to get permits because it’s possible that the
place where you want to hold your rally is not the place where they will allow
you to demonstrate.”
“But calibrated
preemptive response, by the very word ‘preemptive,’ warns the citizenry that it
can be a level higher than BP 880, because there is no definition,” Avena
continued. “What are they preempting, the possibility that there will be
disorder? Under BP 880, the general rule is that people have the right to free
speech and assembly, and supposedly the basis for regulation under that law is
clear and present danger of disturbance. Under calibrated preemptive response,
the people’s exercise of freedom is preempted.”
Purificacion
Quisumbing, chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), had earlier
said that the calibrated preemptive response policy is unlawful. “A blanket no
permit, no rally policy does not have any legal basis,” Quisumbing said in a
televised interview.
“If it’s
preemptive rather than preventive of any violence, it sounds like prior
restraint,” she added. The Constitution prohibits prior restraint on the
exercise of civil liberties.
Press Secretary
Ignacio Bunye has said that the calibrated preemptive response policy is not
equivalent to the exercise of martial law powers. “The constitutional avenues of
protest are open to the people, but the government is keeping its option of
enforcing all laws that will protect commerce, mobility, jobs, livelihood and
the overall peace of mind of the community of the streets,” he said in a
statement.
EO 464
Avena also said
that EO 464 is “scandalous” and arbitrary. “There is no standard by which the
President should give her consent under particular circumstances: if she doesn’t
want you to appear before Congress you cannot do so, and that’s a gag order,”
she explained.
Arroyo issued EO
464 amid a Senate investigation of alleged fraud in the 2004 election, in which
two generals were among those summoned to testify.
Related to this,
Avena said that Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez’s threat of lawsuits against the
so-called “Hyatt 10,” the cabinet officials who resigned in early July and
called for Arroyo’s resignation, as “shooting off the hit.” Gonzalez had said
that former government officials who previously had access to confidential
information and subsequently reveal this to the public could face lawsuits. This
had developed amid statements by the Hyatt 10 that they are willing to testify
in congressional investigations as well as the proposed People’s Tribunal
against Arroyo.
Avena cited
Article III, Sec. 7 of the Constitution, which states that: “The right of the
people to information on matters of public concern shall be recognized. Access
to official records, and to documents and papers pertaining to official acts,
transactions, or decisions,
as well as to
government research data used as basis for policy development, shall be afforded
the citizen, subject to such limitations as may be provided by law.”
According to Avena,
whether government information is to be considered confidential or not is
subject to prior regulation. “There should be prior classification and a clear
basis for classifying information,” she said. “You don’t describe information as
classified just as someone is about to divulge it.”
ATB, Charter
change
Meanwhile, Avena
also said that the ATB and Charter change being pushed by the Arroyo
administration could further heighten the repression that is now being felt.
The ATB defines
terrorism as “the premeditated, threatened, actual use of violence, force, or by
any other means of destruction perpetrated against person/s, property/ies, or
the environment, with the intention of creating or sowing a state of danger,
panic, fear, or chaos to the general public, group of persons or particular
person, or of coercing or intimidating the government to do or abstain from
doing an act.” Avena said in the forum that this definition is a very broad one
that could be taken to encompass even legal protest actions.
Asked what it is
in the Charter change agenda that could bring about an intensification of
repression, Avena said: “In a country like the Philippines where democracy has
not fully matured, when you remove the system of checks and balances and shift
to a parliamentary form of government, when they conspire against the people
it’s total. They can easily pass any law that would violate our rights.”
“It’s worse than
martial law,” she added. “At least under martial law, there are limits and when
you abuse it’s already illegal. But under a parliamentary system, anything they
want to do can be legalized even if it’s in violation of international covenants
and treaties. That is total control.” Bulatlat © 2005 Bulatlat
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