EDITORIAL - Shifting the burden to the accused

The controversy regarding the Anti-Terror Law isn’t dying down anytime soon. According to news reports, the Anti-Terrorism Council (ATC) is set to soon release a list of 25 people they have designated as “terrorists”.

But the designation isn’t final, according to the Department of Justice. Anyone who thinks he may have been wrongfully tagged as a terrorist can request to be removed from the ATC’s list.

“The procedure is already in the IRR (Implementing Rules and Regulations). Any designated party who wishes to be delisted may already do so in pursuant to the IRR," Justice Undersecretary Adrian Sugay, also the spokesman for the ATC, was quoted as saying in a report in Philstar.com

We may not be legal experts, but even we know the basics of law, that anyone is innocent until proven guilty. And the way it is right now it seems the ATC wants to skip the due process part and declare people terrorists first, necessitating their move to prove that they aren’t. This just smells wrong.

The burden to prove any wrongdoing must always fall on the accuser. The situation should not be shifted so that those being accused now have the burden of proving they have not committed any such wrongdoing.

This is not in defense of terrorists. We have long written about this scourge that has been a thorn in our side for some time. But we are concerned for anyone who may become a target for erroneous terror branding. And we all know many people in sensitive positions cannot really tell who the terrorists is.

Some cannot even distinguish between a communist-terrorist who wants to bring the government down and an activist who just wants some positive changes.

It’s also not hard to imagine some agencies making it hard for some persons to be removed from such a list. This is the Philippines after all; politics plays a subtle part in many things.

We don’t have to mention how much damage being tagged as a terrorist will do to a person. Even if he or she is eventually able to prove otherwise, damage will already have been done.

That person’s assets may have already been frozen and reputation tarnished. But that may be the least of his or her worries; it may even put his or her life in danger. That has happened many times to many people placed in so-called lists.