PHILIPPINES: President’s order for prosecutors to go on leave undermines its independence

Prosecution in the Philippines 
http://www.article2.org/mainfile.php/0701/307/

When the five senior public prosecutors, including the chief of the Office of the Chief State Prosecutor (OCSP), were placed on an indefinite leave on 11 January 2009 to comply with orders from President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, it rather exposed the frailties and confirmed the widely acknowledged lack of independence of the country’s prosecution system. 

President Arroyo’s order forcing Jovencito Zuño, chief prosecutor; Phillip Kimpo, senior state prosecutor; Misael Ladaga, state prosecutor and John Resado, investigating prosecutor, to go on an indefinite leave while investigations take place into allegations of their alleged wrongdoings, which include an attempt to exonerate three wealthy young men from charges of illegal drugs in exchange for a bribe. 

It was Raul Gonzalez, secretary of the Department of Justice (DoJ), who had President Arroyo’s order implemented. Gonzalez’s undersecretary, Ricardo Blancaflor, who is also the head of Task Force 211, a Presidential body tasked to investigate and prosecute cases involving political killings, was also ordered to go on leave. 

While it is reasonable that the prosecutors involved should go on leave to ensure that an investigation into allegations of their wrongdoing be conducted, for this order to come from the President, is completely unacceptable. The DoJ and the National Prosecution Service (NPS), to which these prosecutors are attached, certainly have their internal disciplining mechanism to deal with public officials committing any wrongdoing. 

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has since been expressing serious concern about the government’s actions, in particular the executive, of either subverting or undermining the independence of the country’s prosecution service. The very existence of the NSP, whose head and prosecutors are accountable to the DoJ secretary, who is a presidential appointee, has already had its independence undermined. 

What was shocking is that there were neither pretexts nor pretension at all that the order forcing these five prosecutors to take indefinite leave had indeed comes from President herself. It therefore illustrates and confirms the control of the executive branch over the country’s prosecution service through her appointee. In this case, even before a conclusion of the investigating body as to whether or not the prosecutors committed wrongdoings, the President had already acted on her own effectively ignoring any internal procedures and due process that already existed. 

In the normal course of procedure, prior to the imposition of punishments or sanctions to public prosecutors committing wrongdoing, the DoJ secretary has to notify the President after reaching a findings and deciding whether or not to have these decisions implemented. However, when President Arroyo ordered these five prosecutors to go on leave, none of these procedures were observed at all. 

The President’s action therefore had already effectively undermined and attacked the independence of the prosecution service, to which the DoJ is complicit. 

The AHRC once again renews its calls, and supports the long overdue demands of the lawyers and legal fraternity, that the NSP should be separated from the DoJ. The pending proposal which aims towards making the prosecution service completely independent from executive and political control, should be acted upon without further delay. 

The AHRC is deeply concerned by the implications of the President’s actions. It calls for the order to be withdrawn and for the executive to refrain from any further actions that effectively undermines the prosecution service. The prosecutors within the country, public or private, should express concern over the politicization of the prosecution service. The success of prosecuting the public officials, security forces and the head of state, which are facing serious allegations of either tolerating or committing human rights violations, heavily depends on the independence of its prosecution service. 

If the President’s action is allowed to continue, the victims of human rights violation would lose their trust and confidence upon the prosecution service. These victims includes the families of hundreds of victims of extrajudicial killings in recent years, most of whom have yet to obtain legal redress for the violations committed upon them. 

What is of serious concern, too, is the apparent resignation on part of prosecutors involved by simply accepting the order and without challenging the President’s order legally. They should have insisted that the independence of the prosecution service be upheld. They themselves have apparently accepted their plight without putting up a fight at all.