(We yield this space to the joint statement of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan Panay and Panay Alliance Karapatan due to its timeliness. – Ed.)
THE URGE of the Duterte administration to criminalize children is consonant with its policy of kill, kill, kill. So far, the three main wars of this regime have killed thousands of our citizens.
The anti-drug war Oplan Tokhang has taken more than 20,000 lives, but only 5,000 were claimed by the Philippine National Police; the Oplan Kapayaan has killed more than 200 members of the progressive movement mostly farmers, indigenous peoples and human rights defenders; and martial law that continues to cause massive economic dislocation, bombings and other human rights abuses in Mindanao.
But the regime does not stop there. It now targets the vulnerable children, treating them as if they were ordinary citizens who can already vote. House Bills 505 and 2009 are now being rushed in the House of Representatives seeking to lower the minimum age of criminal responsibility from 15 to nine years old. In the upper house, Senate Bill 2026 seeks to lower this from 15 to 12 years old.
The House Committee on Justice approves its version yesterday morning.
Lowering the age of criminal liability from 15 to 9 or 12 is a short-sighted approach to solving criminality involving children and blame is put primarily on children without due consideration of the circumstances behind the involvement of children in crimes. This could only mean that children above nine years old can now be subjected to Oplan Tokhang just as what many youth victims have suffered.
According to scientific studies, a person reaches maturity only at age 16.
Government should conduct an objective and thorough study of the economic and socio-cultural factors behind the involvement of children in crimes. Poverty is a major factor. The social cost of the absence of parents who are forced by work to be away from their families should be remedied. The psychological effect on minors of the prevailing heightened violence and impunity, and other possible factors should also be resolved.
Instead of setting up measures violative of the rights of minors, government should give more emphasis to, and remedy its own failures in providing for the environment where children grow into wholesome individuals and where they find no reason to commit crimes.
