Source: Public Relations and Information Department

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House votes to abolish death penalty
06 June 2006 09:39:36 PM
Writer: Noel Albano, PRID

By a vote of 119-20, the House of Representatives approved on third and final reading Tuesday night the measure, certified as urgent by Malacanang, abolishing the death penalty in the country.

The roll-call vote ended at 9:25 p.m. with congressmen crossing party lines in approving House Bill No. 4826 sponsored by Representatives Orlando Fua Jr., Roberto Cajes, Salacnib Baterina, Edcel Lagman, Jesus Crispin Remulla, and party-list Reps. Loretta Ann Rosales, Mario Aguja and Rene Velarde. A motion was approved making all those who voted for abolition as co-authors.

Speaker Jose de Venecia, who presided as the final vote was taken, called the decision "courageous" and said the measure is a step that restores the sanctity of human life in the way the country dispenses justice.

"We have taken this courageous decision," de Venecia said, "because we believe in the sanctity of human life and in the value of justice not as an act of retribution. This is the mark of a higher civilization."

De Venecia said the death penalty abolition is in consonance with the trend in the European Union and the canons of the Catholic Church.

During the 9th Congress, de Venecia also presided when the House approved on third and final reading the bill imposing the death penalty on certain heinous crimes twelve years ago. "But it was clear then that Congress was going to review the law after a few years."

The House secretary-general was directed to immediately transmit the approved measure to the Senate, and on Deputy Majority Leader Arthur Defensor' motion, the House contingent to the bicameral conference was also officially constituted with Reps. Lagman, Baterina, Luis Villafuerte, Jose Carlos Lacson, Simeon Kintanar, Abraham Mitra, Luis Asistio, Aguja, Rosales, and Satur Ocampo as members.

"The penalty of life imprisonment is just as harsh as the death penalty," said Deputy Speaker Raul del Mar, who was a member of the 9th Congress that approved the death penalty.

The measure - An Act Prohibiting the Imposition of Death Penalty in the Philippines - was submitted for plenary consideration by the Committee on Revision on Laws chaired by Fua. The Act consolidated a total of 16 House bills and one House resolution seeking the abolition of death penalty and repealing Republic Act No. 7659.

"Should the death penalty be provided as the sole and mandatory penalty in a special statute or in the Revised Penal Code, the penalty shall be substituted with that of reclusion perpetua or life imprisonment, as the case may be," HB 4826 provided.

The bill gave weight to the argument that death penalty is "not a deterrent to crime" and that "judicial error" is a possibility in all justice systems. It cited several other reasons for abolishing the death penalty, among them the following:

• death penalty is retributive justice, therefore vengeful and barbaric;
• it is the ultimate cruel and inhuman punishment;
• it is irrevocable;
• it shuts out rehabilitative justice;
• it raises the likelihood of criminals becoming more violent for fear of being convicted by death sentence; and
• it is anti-poor