With time running out, Truth Commission on EJKs proposed

MANILA, Philippines — Officials of the quad committee of the House of Representatives are considering asking President Marcos to create a “Truth Commission” that can devote its time to investigating extrajudicial killings (EJKs) during the Duterte administration.

Rep. Joseph Stephen Paduano of Abang Lingkod party-list, one of the co-chairmen of the panel, made the manifestation Tuesday night, citing as basis the “limited time” of Congress, considering that the May 12 senatorial and local elections are just around the corner.

The 19th Congress, which convened in July 2022, will end on June 30 this year with the election of 12 senators, along with 246 new members of the House from the legislative districts and 64 party-list congressmen that will comprise the 20th Congress.

Paduano, chairman of the House public accounts committee, pointed out law enforcement agencies like the Philippine National Police (PNP) or the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), or any agency for that matter, will definitely be “overwhelmed” to investigate 7,000 cases of EJKs.

His fellow chairman, Manila Rep. Benny Abante of the House human rights committee, was amenable to the suggestion.

Meanwhile, Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers said that EJK should be a special heinous crime separate from murder, as he represented the authors of House Bill No. 10986, or the Anti-Extrajudicial Killing Act during yesterday’s hearing of the justice committee.

“The intention of the proposal to us is really to elevate the killing perpetrated by state agents higher than the so-called murder, if that is possible,” Barbers said.

“If they (perpetrators) are not state agents or persons in authority, then therefore they fall under a different category. But if they are state agents and committed such crime, that is considered to be extrajudicial killing,” he said.

Barbers told the committee and its resource persons that the proposal of the anti-EJK bill’s authors is to have a separate law defining and punishing EJK. –  Jose Rodel Clapano