It is becoming increasingly obvious that getting away with murder in the Philippines is made easy by the absence of any functioning witness protection scheme. The lack of witnesses also becomes a convenient excuse for investigators to say that they have done their jobs but have no further avenues for action.
In a May 31 letter to the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) Police Director of the Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management at the national police headquarters Marcelo Ele Jr admits that the main obstacle to solving two recent killings in Camarines Norte, Luzon is the lack of witnesses. In the case of Ernesto Bang, an organiser in a peasant organisation who was shot dead at the door of his house on May 10, “Relatives of the victim
are no longer interested in filing the case due to the absence of a witness”, Ele states. As for Joel Reyes, a political party organiser who was shot dead by a gunman posing as a passenger in his tricycle, “no witnesses had come out in the open for fear of reprisal”.
In a May 30 letter, Paquito Nacino, regional director of the Commission on Human Rights in Tacloban City, Visayas, revealed that it had set aside its investigations into three murders there for the same reason. According to the Commission, a witness to the March 14 killing of human rights lawyer Felidito Dacut “is nowhere to be found”. Meanwhile, the relatives of peasant movement leaders Fr. Edison Lapuz and Alfredo Malinao, who were killed in a May 12 shooting in Leyte have been “uncooperative and shown unwillingness to make any written statements”. The wife of Fr. Lapuz, who witnessed his killing, “requested to give her more time to decide [about complaining] as the assailants are still unknown to [the family]”.
A wife hesitates to complain about the killing of her husband in cold blood; a person runs for his life after the murder of his colleague and friend; a man is shot dead in a public street and no one can be found to identify the murderer. What is going on? Although provisions exist for witness protection in the Philippines, clearly they are not working. Republic Act 6981 guarantees that witnesses will be given the necessary protection, security and benefits. The Department of Justice is the agency responsible for arranging witness protection. So why isn’t it doing its job? Despite the numerous reports of victims’ families refusing to press complaints or witnesses going into hiding out of fear after the unrestrained killings of human rights defenders, peasant leaders, lawyers and others, there doesn’t seem to be any serious effort by the Philippine authorities to address this issue. Unrestrained vigilante killings occurring in cities like Davao and Cebu suggest the same failure. In these cases most victims have been ordinary poor civilians: however, as in other targeted killings, no witnesses have come forward.
With the alarming incidence of extrajudicial killings and unresolved murders in the Philippines it is essential that a swift and effective programme for witness protection be established. Where witnesses and family members of victims are left exposed and unattended, they become easy targets for threats and coercion by the perpetrators. This is particularly so in cases like the killing of Lapuz and Malinao, where the military is suspected of having had involvement. Without witness cooperation, cases are left unsolved and very often cannot even be lodged in court. For their part, the investigators shelve their files and have the easy excuses that “we couldn’t find witnesses” or “the relatives wouldn’t cooperate” with which to absolve themselves of responsibility. In so doing, the whole issue of why no witnesses are available or no relatives would cooperate is avoided.
The government of the Philippines has given assurances at the highest levels that the perpetrators of these killings will not go unpunished, but without a proper scheme for witness protection such assurances are meaningless. The government should immediately review the management and handling of witness protection by the Department of Justice with a view to greatly enhancing and expanding the scheme so that security can be given immediately and for as long as necessary to those who need it. This requires a sense of urgency: the unrestrained killings occurring in the Philippines at present will be neither solved nor abated until the government recognises that immediate and effective witness protection is the missing element. Ironically, while investigators place such strong emphasis on witness testimony to obtain convictions, they have little interest in the wellbeing of the witnesses themselves. Until witness protection is taken seriously, the prospects for protection of human rights, criminal justice and the rule of law in the Philippines remain dim.
