Home 
MANILA, Philippines -- Assailing the Arroyo administration over its alleged inaction on the follow-up report of United Nations special rapporteur Philip Alston on extrajudicial killings, militant party list representatives on Monday urged a joint investigation by the Senate and the House of Representatives on the matter.
At the same time, the lawmakers called for the creation of a congressional oversight body on extrajudicial killings monitor how the government is dealing with the cases and oversee implementation of laws related to human rights and extra judicial killings.
Representatives Satur Ocampo, Teodoro Casino and Neri Colmenares of Bayan Muna, Luz Ilagan and Liza Maza of Gabriela, Rafael Mariano and Joel Maglunsod of Anakpawis, and Raymond Palatino of Kabataan will file a resolution with their counterparts in the Senate to find out why the government has failed to come up with measures to curb extrajudicial killings.
The militant partylist bloc in the House of Representatives supports the major recommendations of Alston in his follow-up report dated April 29, 2009. The first report came out in April 2008.
In his report, Alston pointed out that the Arroyo administration has failed to institutionalize reforms recommended two years ago to stop extrajudicial killings in the country.
”We support the recommendations the Alston committee, particularly, when he said that the government is not doing its role in removing the stumbling block for effective oversight by Congress on the PNP [Philippine National Police] and the AFP [Armed Forces of the Philippines] in their operational activities,” Ocampo said at the weekly minority press conference.
Casino said that “the ball is now in Congress’ hand” to institute mechanisms such as the oversight body that will take a more comprehensive review of the government’s counter-insurgency programs such as the actions of the Department of Justice to stop extra-judicial killings.
Malacañang had disputed the Alston report, saying that the Arroyo administration had acted on the killings, including the setting up of a P25-million fund to end the spate of political killings.
Ilagan said the inaction on the report of the international body showed how “dense” the Arroyo administration was on the real situation in the country.
Contrary to the government’s report, she said that killings and harassment continue in Mindanao, recently victimizing environmental activists and indigenous communities.
Ocampo also urged Congress to endorse Alston’s recommendation to abolish the Inter-Agency Legal Action Group (IALAG), headed by National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales.
The IALAG has been responsible for the filing of allegedly spurious criminal charges against leaders and members of legal organizations, alleging they are members of the CPP-NPA-NDF.
“Congress is the major institution that can immediately assert its oversight powers on the excesses of the Executive, particularly the AFP and PNP, that has cost lives of innocent civilians since Arroyo came into power since 2001,” added Ocampo.
