2 progressive solons slam Duterte proposal to arm civilian volunteers in fighting crime

Two progressive lawmakers on Monday denounced the suggestion of President Rodrigo Duterte to arm anti-crime civilian organizations. 

Bayan Muna party-list Representative Carlos Zarate said this move is just “a bloody disaster waiting to happen.”

He reasoned out that at present, there were already security forces who abused their authority to possess guns. 

“If this is allowed then incidents involving gun abuse — such as Jonel Nuezca in December 2020, and Hensie Zinampan earlier this year — would grow exponentially. This will only worsen the already discredited but bloody 'nanlaban' claim of the police,” Zarate said in a statement. 

"All policemen and soldiers should instead have bodycams to prevent abuses and not more people carrying guns. There are more productive ways to spend the people's budget other than this absurd and another militarist proposal," he added. 

With the continuing threat of the COVID-19 pandemic, Zarate stressed that the Duterte administration should instead focus on efforts to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus. 

For her part, ACT Teachers party-list Representative France Castro said the proposal would only allow more crimes to happen. 

“President Duterte once again is proposing policies that would only kill more Filipinos instead of solving the roots of the many crises felt in the country. What the people need is for the government to ensure a faster vaccine roll-out and increase testing and tracing capacities to address the worsening health crisis,” Castro said. 

“The people need adequate and urgent aid and for the government to solve the worsening economic crisis. When these problems are solved, there would be fewer crimes in the streets. We do not need more guns that pave the way to more vigilante and extra judicial killings," Castro added. 

Last week, Duterte said he is open to arm civilians amid the fight against criminality. He said this during the launch of the Global Coalition of Lingkod Bayan Advocacy Support Groups and Force Multipliers in Camp Crame, which aims to help police officers in their efforts against lawless activities. 

The Commission on Human Rights opposed this proposal, saying the Philippine National Police (PNP) is more than enough in fighting crimes. 

PNP chief Police General Guillermo Eleazar on Monday however clarified that anti-crime volunteers are not employed as law enforcers and are still considered as regular civilians.

“Magbibigay lang po ng impormasyon. Unang-una, hindi po ito employed law enforcers. Gusto po natin linawin. Siguro nami-misinterpret lang dahil nabanggit na puwede silang magkaroon ng baril’ he said.

(They will only give information. First of all, they are not employed as law enforcers. We want to clarify that. Perhaps it is being misinterpreted just because it was mentioned that they can have guns.) —KG, GMA News