American lawmaker to lead protest against Duterte if he visits US

AN American lawmaker vowed to lead a protest against Philippine President Rodrigo R. Duterte should he pay a visit to the United States.

Massachusetts Representative James “Jim” McGovern (2^nd district-Democrat) issued this vow during the US congressional hearing into the war on drugs in the Philippines late Thursday night (Manila time).

“If he comes, I will lead the protest,” said the Democratic lawmaker, who co-chairs the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, named after the only Holocaust survivor who served in the US Congress.

“A man with the human rights record of Mr. Duterte should not be invited to the White House.”

Although Mr. McGovern recognized the good ties between Manila and Washington, he said the US

cannot tolerate the alarming number of human rights violations in the Philippines resulting from the drug war.

“The US government cannot afford any degree of complicity with the kinds of human rights violations that are occurring,” the American lawmaker said, referring to the summary executions of suspects as “simply murder.”

“The explosion of killings over the last year — and the president’s own statements inciting and justifying them as part of his promise to eradicate the drug problem — have rightly drawn attention and indignation,” he added.

Launched at the beginning of President Duterte’s term last year, the drug war has resulted in anywhere from 7,000 to 12,000 deaths, a number that includes several children considered as “collateral damage” by the police. These figures easily breach the 3,000 killed and murdered during the Marcos regime that lasted two decades.

During the hearing in Washington, three representatives from different human rights organizations served as panelists and offered their testimonies.

Citing December 2016 figures, Mr. Ellecer Santos, spokesperson of iDEFEND said that 6,000 have become widows or widowers; 18,000 sons and daughters have become fatherless, motherless, or orphaned altogether — many of whom witnessed killings; 12,000 parents have lost children; and at least 32 kids were killed by the campaign against illegal drugs.

Mr. Santos also narrated how Mr. Duterte’s drug war mostly target the poorest, saying that the President

has been “exploiting the Filipino people’s misperceptions about drug dependency” and making them feel that “[drug dependents] are inhuman and worthy of elimination.”

“It is sad that this present leadership has chosen to assault and further brutalize them,” he added.

For his part, Mr. Matthew Wells, senior crisis advisor of Amnesty International said that “the Duterte administration has encouraged abusive practices [among members of the police].”

In some areas of the Philippines, police officers have received significant under-the-table payments for “encounters” in which alleged drug offenders were killed, he said, citing results of an investigation the group conducted.

For his part, Mr. Phelim Kine, deputy director, Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said that “efforts to seek accountability for drug-war deaths have gone nowhere.”

Mr. Kine scored National Police chief Ronald M. Dela Rosa for rejecting calls for an impartial probe on killings, singling out Justice Secretary Vitaliano N. Aguirre III for his “total disregard for the rule of law and due legal process for drug personalities by questioning the humanity of suspected drug users and dealers.”

He also cited political persecution of now detained Senator Leila M. De Lima, one of Mr. Duterte’s staunchest critics, due to “politically motivated drug charges,” and the government’s lack of cooperation with Dr. Agnes Callamard, United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.

He also recommended that the US Congress should play an active oversight role to ensure heightened vigilance in the country.

The body can “further restrict assistance to the Philippine security forces by imposing specific human rights benchmarks, including requiring Duterte to end the “drug war” killings and allow a United Nations-led investigation into the deaths,” he said. — Jil Danielle M. Caro