De Lima asks SC to reconsider ruling on petition for protection vs Duterte tirades
Credit to Author: The Manila Times| Date: Wed, 05 Feb 2020 12:15:40 +0000
INSISTING that her rights were violated, opposition Senator Leila de Lima has asked the Supreme Court (SC) to reconsider its resolution dismissing her habeas data petition which seeks to protect her from President Rodrigo Duterte’s continued threats and verbal attacks.
In a 20-page motion for reconsideration filed on Wednesday by counsel Manuel Diokno, de Lima argued that the resolution “has twisted the doctrine of presidential immunity out of all sense of meaning”.
“[T]he Resolution has twisted the doctrine of presidential immunity into a grotesque version of itself, inoculated the President from accountability for egregious conduct, and placed an insurmountable barrier to the search for truth and the vindication of
basic rights,” she said.
Last October 15, the Supreme Court en banc dismissed De Lima’s habeas data petition on the ground that the President was immune from any criminal, civil and administrative suit during his presidency. The high court’s resolution was only made public last January 22.
A writ of habeas data is “a legal remedy available to any person whose right to privacy in life, liberty or security has been violated or under threat by the unlawful gathering of information about the person, his or her family and home”.
De Lima said that Duterte has resumed his verbal attacks against her during his speech on the occasion of the Ceremonial Distribution of Benefits to Former Rebels in San Isidro, Leyte, last January 23, a day after the release of the Supreme Court Resolution.
In her habeas data petition, De Lima has recalled how Duterte admitted his personal grudge against her way back when she was chairman of the Commission on Human Rights investigating his link with the dreaded Davao Death Squad.
She claimed that Duterte’s personal and oftentimes sexist tirades against her escalated when she opened a Senate investigation into the spate of extrajudicial killings and summary executions into the administration’s all-out war on drugs.
She added that the President’s continued verbal attacks and threats also deprived her of an effective remedy in violation of her rights guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
“It is not disputed that petitioner is the victim of slut-shaming, discrimination as a woman, and psychological violence perpetrated by the highest executive official of our government,” she said.
“It is not disputed that President Duterte gathered information about petition’s private life – including, by his own admission, information from a foreign government – and broadcast it to the entire nation,” she added.
De Lima, however, maintained that these acts clearly involved the wrongful collection and publication of her alleged private affairs, which she argued constituted unlawful interference into her privacy and unlawful attacks on her honor and reputation.
She said the Supreme Court resolution violated the ICCPR which imposed a duty on the Philippine government to provide victims of gross human rights violations with the right to an effective, prompt and adequate remedy.WILLIAM B. DEPASUPIL