I.

Ever since President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office almost two

years ago, 33 people have been killed daily nationwide. This is
shown by Philippine National Police (PNP) documents obtained by
Rappler. In about two years – from July 1, 2016, up to June 11,
2018 – police have recorded 23,518 Homicide Cases Under
Investigation (HCUI), equivalent to an average of 33 people killed
a day. 1

HCUIs are murder and homicide cases combined, excluding

killings by cops in police operations. Riding-in-tandem killings,
being homicides and murders too, are included in this tally. From
July 1, 2016 to May 15, 2018, the government’s counting initiative
#RealNumbersPH has tallied 4,279 suspects killed in anti-illegal
drug operations, or an average of 6 a day.The 4,279 are not
included in HCUIs as they are presumed to have been carried out
by cops in the line of duty. 2

The killings come as the Duterte administration continues to

pursue an unrelenting campaign against drug suspects and
criminals, with the President going on record on multiple
occasions, encouraging law enforcers and Filipinos to harm and
even kill delinquents.

A quick look at PNP data on Duterte’s first year in office shows

that the campaign has resulted in a drop in all index crimes (or
crimes against persons and property) – but not the killings.

A United Nations (UN) committee urged the Philippines to stop

extrajudicial killings in the country, and warned that declarations
by high-ranking officials could "legitimize" violence against drug
users. The Committee urges the State to stop and prevent
extrajudicial killings and any form of violence against drug users;
to promptly and thoroughly investigate all reported cases and
punish the perpetrators with sanctions commensurate with the
gravity of the crime; and to take all necessary measures to ensure
that the fight against drug trafficking does not have a
discriminatory impact on the poor and marginalized.

Definitely, the drug problem has to be tackled head-on before it

gets any worse. As it is now, it is really ugly. But we need to further
 develop our systems—police, judicial, penal, medical, political,
economic, social, etc.—to cope with this highly complex problem.

We obviously cannot remain at the current state of our laws that

are now found to be ineffective or lacking in something necessary.
We have to understand that our human laws need to evolve
without abandoning their essential purpose. They need to be
updated to adapt to current situations.

A more appropriate system of checks and balances among the

different branches and agencies of our government should be put
in place.

II. Section 1 of our Bill of Rights3 provides: “No person shall be

deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor
shall any person be denied the equal protection of the laws.” This
means that nobody, including the Government, can try to end your
life. It also means the Government should take appropriate
measures to safeguard life by making laws to protect its citizens
and, in some circumstances, by taking steps to protect the citizens
if their lives are at risk. Public authorities should also consider the
people’s right to life when making decisions that might put them in
danger or that affect their life expectancy.

With the Philippine National Police (PNP)’s pronouncement that

there is no single case of extra-judicial killing under the current
administration, the Commission on Human Rights insists that EJK
“encompasses any killing by Government forces as well as killings
by any other groups or individuals which the Government fails to
investigate, prosecute and punish when it is in a position to do so,”
as defined by former UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston. Limiting
the definition of EJK based only on a focused operational definition
provided in the Administrative Order 35 would discount killings that
are also perpetrated by state agents and non-state actors that
remain uninvestigated.

Thousands of deaths have been reported to be committed by

both vigilante and police personnel during the ongoing anti-illegal
drug operations. The Commission maintains that killing must never
be an option to solve the drug problem in the country. Although there
 are high-profile personalities being caught and killed in the campaign,
Filipinos in lower socio-economic classes tend to suffer more, and
yet, no one has been held accountable for any of these killings.

The police must take reasonable steps to ensure that the right
to life of everyone, including suspects and criminals, are protected,
and to observe maximum tolerance when faced with situations where
force is necessary. In the fight against criminality, strong justice
institutions coupled with accountable police and law enforcement
agencies are necessary for perpetrators of violations to be held to
account and to restore trust based on equal rights among the people.

If there are cases of deaths during police operations that exhibit

excessive use of force, it is imperative that the State launch effective
and meaningful investigations of these alleged violations. The usual
reason of ‘nanlaban’ does not justify the killings. Denying these
allegations without observing due process of law would not yield
substantial solution to the issue, but would just cultivate a culture of
impunity within the ranks.

III. Pompeius Festus defines homo sacer 4, the sacred man, this
way: “The sacred man is the one whom the people have judged
on account of a crime. It is not permitted to sacrifice this an, yet
he who kills him will not be condemned for homicide; in the first
tribunitarian law, in fact, it is noted that ‘if someone kills the one
who is sacred according to the plebiscite, it will not be considered
homicide.’ This is why it is customary for a bad or impure man to
be called sacred.” It is easy to see the apparent contradiction: the
person is sacred, but their death is unpunishable. Even stranger,
the person whom anyone could kill could not be killed with any
ritual practices (such as the apparently standard sprinkling of
salted flour on the forehead of a sacrificial animal).
Modern interpretations of this passage fall along two
lines. Some see this sacredness as a weakened and secularized
residue of a time when religious law was not distinguished from penal
law, in which death sentences were sacrifices to the gods. On the
other hand, some think it is analogous to the ethnological idea of the
taboo: honoured and damned, venerated and horrible. The first
group cannot explain why sacred man cannot be sacrificed, and the
second group cannot explain why anyone can kill him. The homo
 sacer is at the intersection of being able to be killed but not sacrificed:
it is outside both human and divine law 5.
It looks like a limit concept of the Roman social order, and it
cannot be explained from the perspective of either the human or the
divine order of things. Still, it might help us understand the limits of
those two realms. Instead of trying to turn the homo sacer into an
example of some other legal category, Agamben is going to look at it
as its own thing, its own political structure. The people give up some
of their power to the government, and the government provides
justice. Hence, we respect the law and follow it because we are all
implicit signatories to a contract. We have seen that the sovereign is
both inside and outside the law, because of their capacity to suspend
the law. Like the Leviathan of the social contract, the sovereign has
the right to kill, but they specifically have the right to kill the person
who is both inside and outside the law: the homo sacer, or sacred
man.

1 UN committee to Philippines: Stop extrajudicial killings, Oct 12, 2017 at Rappler

2 At least 33 killed daily in the Philippines since Duterte assumed office, June 28, 2018 at Rappler
3 1987 Constitution
4 On the Significance of Words by Pompeius Festus
5 Homo Sacer by Giorgio Agamben