Justice Denied Is Corruption Personified
PUBLISHED ON February 7, 2009 AT 6:17 PM
The one thing
that is sure to seriously damage or even destroy
any family, community, organization, society, a
nation, or even the international trade and
banking system is when those in power and
authority act immorally, unjustly and subvert
the rule of law or manipulate it to benefit
themselves. The offender can be a father or
relative that abuses a child, a local official
who condones it, a prosecutor who accepts a
bribe to dismiss the charge, a judge who rules
unjustly on technicality, a leader who
encourages death squads, or manipulate election
results, is mired in corruption and fraud or a
powerful nation that oppresses a poorer one.
All are
perverts and criminals of one kind or another,
even bankers steeped in greed and avarice,
especially the rich that exploit the poor must
be made answer for their crimes. The impunity
that government officials grant themselves, the
failure of the justice system, the corruption
that brings cholera, massacres, death squads,
dictatorship, misery suffering, anger and
rebellion to a nation is why we need a stronger
International Criminal Court. What is needed is
restorative justice that heals the victims,
rights terrible wrongs, and brings the criminals
to a just and truly-deserved punishment. The
greatest pain is when the rich and powerful
subvert government and use it to their own
greedy ends and cause hardship and deprivation
to others.
In the
Philippines, the good, honest, hardworking
prosecutors and staff of the Department of
Justice (DOJ) are not the only ones to be
depressed and disheartened by the unsavory
allegations of bribery, case-fixing and justice
for sale throughout the DOJ. The erosion of
trust and confidence in this, the most important
department of government, is very alarming.
While I know
and admire prosecutors of great integrity, there
are those who sympathize with the rapists of
children; we have many such cases and it is
shocking in the extreme. The scandalous case of
an American citizen accused by his wife of
sexually abusing her 5 year-old child despite
strong evidence that established probable cause
was granted bail despite this being a child rape
that is non-bailable. Instead, the same
prosecutor in Iba, Zambales that recommended the
granting of bail by the judge also recommended
the prosecution of the mother for allegedly
abusing her 10 year-old son who is in the
custody and control of the American. Clearly
this is a set-up counter charge and since she is
poor, she could not get bail and is now the one
in jail, hopeless and forlorn. Her little girl
is taken by the the DSWD. What a travesty of
justice. Is there no one courageous, honest
person in authority capable of righting this
terrible wrong?
The case of a
group of fishermen from Parel Botolan, Zambales
is another shocker enough to make one run to the
hills. In 2002, a wealthy foreigner and his wife
set up fish cages near the traditional fishing
grounds of the village. The families faced
salvation and made a petition exercising freedom
of speech to the government to have them
removed. The rich family filed two charges of
libel against the fisher folk and the prosecutor
resolved the case in favor of the rich family.
The fisher folk faced jail or pay bail. They
appealed to the Department of Justice and a good
state prosecutor dismissed the charges. In 2004,
the fisher folk still tried to have the cages
removed and the rich family filed a charge of
falsification of private documents saying some
of the 100 signatures in their petition were
false.
The justice
system is their favorite weapon of choice with a
biased prosecutor helping them. That prosecutor
was eventually dismissed from the DOJ when she
was caught forging the signature of a judge and
using his seal on a marriage annulment. Today,
she is the private lawyer of the fish cage
owners and she is prosecuting the fisher folk.
All previous cases prosecuted by her ought to be
reviewed by the DOJ and those victimized by her
are ought to appeal their cases. With
prosecutors like this and those releasing the
drug trafficking suspects and allowing child
rapists to go free, how can there be justice and
peace. Is this why the Philippines has been
marked as the most corrupt in Asia?
With Knowledge Comes Power
Start learning the
laws the country is said to hold
so we can stop the corruption by keeping one
another accountable.
