MANILA — The Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) asked the Supreme Court (SC) to dismiss the four consolidated petitions seeking to void the full-year extension of martial law and the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in Mindanao.
The top government counsel on Wednesday filed its 99-page memorandum on the four petitions questioning its constitutionality of one-year extension of martial law in Mindanao.
Solicitor General Jose Calida said the high court already ruled that President Rodrigo Duterte had “sufficient factual bases” to show that actual rebellion exists in the region.
“The rebels are committing atrocities and causing civilian casualties. Public safety requires the extension for one year,” Calida said.
“The effect of martial law is obviously more than psychological as the perception of public safety heightened with increased military presence, unabated checkpoints, and undeterred offensives against rebels or terrorists,” he stressed.
“The actions of the military have, in effect, addressed the widespread fear and panic among peace-loving Filipinos in Mindanao,” Calida added.
The Solicitor General opined that there is no need to show the magnitude of the rebellion, and placing the requirement of public safety on a scale, or even continuum, will not only prevent the application of the laws but undermine the Constitution.
“Martial law as an option of the President exists precisely to address a rebellion that endangers public safety. The fact that our countrymen, both Christians and Muslims, have somehow managed to go about their daily lives in Mindanao does mean that there is no need for the extension of the proclamation of martial law and suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus,” Calida noted.
According to Calida, since the SC already declared that there is rebellion in Mindanao, the burden lies on the petitioners to show that the rebellion has been completely quelled.
“Since petitioners have not shown facts to the contrary, they cannot ask the court to set aside the extension of the proclamation and suspension,” Calida noted.
He also chided the petitioners for asking the nullification of the extension on the flimsy ground that petitioners believe that the exercise of a more benign Commander-in-Chief power would suffice. “It is not the place of the petitioners to dictate on the President which of the three Commander-in-Chief powers is most appropriate in dealing with the ongoing rebellion.”
The SC received four petitions filed by the congressmen led by Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman et al; another group led by Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate and Anakpawis Rep. Ariel Casilao, et al; former Commission on Human Rights chair Etta Rosales; and a group led by Christian Monsod, one of the framers of the Constitution seeking to declare the martial law extension in Mindanao as unconstitutional.
All petitions stated that the extension, which was approved by Congress in a joint 240-27 vote last December, lacked sufficient factual basis as Marawi City was already liberated and key leaders of the rebellion were reported dead.
The solicitor general, however, argued that the liberation of Marawi City did not signal the end of the rebellion in the whole of Mindanao.
He likewise said that the petitioners failed to prove that Congress acted in grave abuse of discretion when it granted the request of President Duterte to extend martial law in Mindanao as well as demonstrated that there was a clear breach of the Constitution in such a move.
In their separate memorandum, the National Union of People’s Lawyers (NUPL) is one of the petitioners challenging the factual basis of President Rodrigo Duterte’s year-long extension of martial law in Mindanao.
“It is Petitioners’ firm assertion that it is the public safety requirement and not rebellion or invasion alone, which is the most decisive element in the martial law powers of the President,” members of the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers said in their memorandum filed before the SC.
They raised that the SC “must step out of the traditional understanding of public safety and must contextually define, nuance or at least describe the level of threat to public safety, which ‘requires’ the imposition of martial law and not merely ‘necessitates’ the calling out powers of the President.”
Last January 17, the high court ended the two-day oral arguments on the four consolidated petitions against the martial law extension in Mindanao.
On Dec. 13, 2017, a total of 240 members of Congress voted to approve to extend martial law in Mindanao, while only 27 voted against it. The approved extension would take effect beginning Jan. 1, 2018 until Dec. 31, 2018.
In December last year, the high court upheld with finality the constitutionality of Duterte’s declaration of martial law in Mindanao.
The SC’s 82-page landmark decision, penned by Associate Justice Mariano Del Castillo, said that the 1987 Constitution granted Duterte the prerogative to put any part of the country under martial rule. (PNA)
