Advocate's Overview: Writ of amparo and the IP month

2 MIN READ

By ARTHUR L. ALLAD-IW

Every month of October has been observed by the church and various organizations as the Indigenous Peoples Month. The church dedicated this month to bring out the issues of IPs to the public.

It became a tradition. For indigenous peoples and advocates that October also to focused on issues and updates on indigenous peoples concerns.

An issue affecting IPs in the region is the recent abduction of James Balao. Abducted on September 17 in Tomay, La Trinidad, James is still missing up to now. His family and friends has been seeking the help of various individuals and offices locate James.

His family also tried the judicial process. They filed a petition for Writ of Amparo at Benguet’s Regional Trial Court on Tuesday.

I remember that enforced disappearance was an urgent issue of the Cordillera peoples in 1987 when Kalinga tribal leader and Daniel Ngayaan, also a leader of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance, was abducted by members of the Cordillera Peoples Liberation Army (CPLA), a para-military group led by then priest-turned-rebel-turned paramilitary – Conrado Balweg.

Ngayaan’s family and friends exhausted various means to locate and resurface him but to no avail. As far as I remember, his family filed a petition for habeas corpus against the late Conrado Balweg and others believed responsible. The court, however, failed to produce Ngayaan.

The writ of habeas corpus as a remedy, where a person or group is ordered by the court to produce the missing person can end there if the person or group prove that the person is not in their possession.

Balweg might be legally able to evade the sanctions as a consequence of the abduction. He was not able to deny the fact, well known among the people of Cagaluan and nearby areas of Kalinga, that it was the CPLA that abducted Ngayaan, whose remains until now were not recovered, denying him a decent burial.

The abduction of James is a test case for the newly issued writ of amparo. The writ of amparo legally cured the weakness of the Habeas Corpus. In a petition for the writ of amparo, the commanded person or institution by the court cannot just say that the missing is not in their custody. They must prove they had exhausted all means to locate the said missing person, or those who are illegally deprived of their liberty. This is a legal remedy at hand, and everybody hope it would work with the present reality.

Regardless of my opinion, however, I join his family’s and friends’ call to resurface James Balao.

Enforced disappearance cases in the Philippines are fast growing in numbers. It was brought out to the attention of the United Nations’ Human Rights Commission after Prof. Philip Alston visited the Philippines and came out with report that the cases, like extra-judicial killings, are done with impunity. He too came up with recommendations but nothing has yet happened.

Enforced disappearance and extra-judicial killings are abhorred as among the worst kinds of human rights violations.

Regardless of the victims, whether Ngayaan, Balao or Jonas Burgos, something must be done to stop this state policy. #