MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Human Rights announced Wednesday the appointment of commissioner Leah Tanodra-Armamento as the body’s new chairperson.
Tanodra-Armamento, who is part of the present and fifth Commission en banc, will serve the unexpired term of former chair Chito Gascon, who passed away last year.
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The appointments of the present Commission en banc—commissioners Karen Gomez-Dumpit, Gwendolyn Pimentel-Gana and Roberto Eugenio Cadiz—will expire on May 5, 2022. They were appointed by late President Benigno Aquino III in 2015.
Prior to joining the CHR, Tanodra-Armamento worked at the Office of the Solicitor General as an associate solicitor. She then transferred to the Department of Justice and moved her way up from state prosecutor to senior state prosecutor.
In 2003, she was appointed as the DOH assistant chief state prosecutor and chaired the legal panel of the government during the 1996 review of the final peace agreement’s implementation between the Philippines and the Moro National Liberation Front. Then, she was appointed as DOJ undersecretary.
The new CHR chair got her law degree from the Ateneo De Manila University School of Law. She was also a fellow of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government in 2007.
Gascon, a political activist, died in October 2021 due to COVID-19. He was 57.
Gascon’s tenure as CHR chairperson came at a challenging time of worsening human rights situation in the Philippines. He and the CHR were attacked for condemning the Duterte administration’s bloody war on drugs.