MANILA – Lawyers urged the United Nations to look into the threat of President Rodrigo Duterte to the Supreme Court chief justice, saying it was “detrimental to the independence of judges and lawyers in the country.”
Duterte urged the House of Representatives to fast-track the impeachment of Maria Lourdes Sereno, lawyers’ groups led by the Integrated Bar of the Philippines said in a report submitted to Diego Garcia Sayan, UN special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers.
“The recent tirades of the President against the Chief Justice do not sound at all foreboding,” said the lawyers’ groups.
These “rather expectedly punctuate the long-winded attacks on judicial independence that began almost two years ago, when the Chief Justice dared resist an apparent intrusion into judicial power,” they said.
Aside from the IBP, groups that submitted the report Wednesday were the National Union of People’s Lawyers, Alternative Law Groups, Ateneo Human Rights Center, Free Legal Assistance Group, Manananggol Laban sa EJKs, and the International Pro Bono Alliance.
Last week Sereno dared Duterte to explain why Solicitor General Jose Calida, the chief government lawyer, initiated the quo warranto petition questioning her appointment and seeking her removal as chief justice if the President was, as he claimed, not involved in moves to unseat her.
In response, in a speech before leaving for an official trip China, Duterte told Sereno to count him in as her “enemy” and said he will ask the House to fast-track her impeachment.
Sereno went on leave as she prepares for a possible impeachment trial at the Senate. She was accused of failing to explain her wealth while having a lavish lifestyle.
‘THREAT TO CRITICAL LAWYERS’
In addition, the lawyers’ groups pointed out Duterte’s public reprimand of IBP president Abdiel Dan Elijah Fajardo when the latter spoke about the need for the Office of the Ombudsman to be “insulated from political pressure” and for public officials not to be “onion-skinned.”
“It appears that lawyers who criticize government policies, as well as those whose clients have been tagged as ‘dissenters’ or ‘activists’ are harassed. The lawyers are labeled ‘rebels’ and ‘criminals’ and consequently subjected to intense surveillance,” the groups said.
Moreover, “the State’s continued inaction toward the deaths of lawyers creates an environment where lawyers are hesitant to accept drugs cases, especially to participate as legal counsel for persons accused of illegal drug activities,” they said.
“Such jeopardizes the very essence of democracy in the Philippines, particularly the matter of checks and balances. Hence, this appeal for urgent action on the part of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers,” they added.
The lawyers also brought up the petition for proscription, filed by the Department of Justice, considering the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army as terrorists, in which 600 individuals, including a lawyer, a former congressman, and a UN Special Rapporteur, were enumerated as alleged officers or members of the rebel group./PN
