By ANNE MARXZE D. UMIL
Bulatlat.com
MANILA – Environmental group Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment assailed the Court of Appeals decision denying environmentalists Jhed Tamano and Jonila Castro’s petition for writ of amparo and writ of habeas data.
The writ of amparo is a legal remedy for the protection of victims of human rights violations while the writ of habeas data seeks to release and destroy personal information being held that threatens one’s life and security and violates the right to privacy.
In its decision, the CA said that Tamano and Castro failed to “sufficiently identify that the perpetrators of their abduction are, in fact, affiliated with the Philippine military or any of the government agencies.” The court added that the two also failed to establish the imminent threat or continuing threat and that there is also no threat inside the military camp where the two were being held from Sept. 12 to 19, 2023 and there is no proof of continuing threat from Sept. 19, 2023 to May 2024.
In a statement, Kalikasan said the CA decision highlights the limitations inherent in existing mechanisms for redress in the country.
“Its claim of insufficient evidence to support the allegations of state-sponsored abduction contradicts the broader documented pattern of state attacks against environmental defenders,” the group said in a statement.
They added that since 2001, over half of extrajudicial killings of environmental defenders have been linked to state agents. “Since 2012, the Philippines has been recognized as the most dangerous and deadly country in Asia for environmental defenders,” the group said.
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The decision was penned by CA Associate Justice Lorenzana Bordois and was concurred by the CA en banc with one dissenting opinion by CA Associate Justice Emily L. San Gaspar-Gito.
What the CA former 8th Division fail to recognize
“We are appalled and we are indignant for Jonila and Jhed, and all victims of enforced disappearance and fake or forced surrenders,” said Karapatan Secretary General Cristina Palabay.
She said that the CA decision is another proof that the “climate of impunity persists under the Marcos Jr. administration, with the insufficiency, inadequacy or failure of domestic redress mechanisms to render justice for victims of enforced disappearance and other human rights violations.”
“While acknowledging that the two young women were victims of abduction and illegal detention, the CA division, in their decision, failed to recognize the accountability of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) – institutions who publicly acknowledged that they had custody of the two,” Palabay said.
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Palabay said that by denying Tamano and Castro’s petition, the CA failed to recognize that in the 17 days of detention of two, the State had violated their basic constitutional rights to due process, to independent counsel of choice, to security and liberty, of freedom from fear, against torture and illegal detention.
She added that the CA also failed to recognize the risks and vulnerabilities of human rights defenders like Tamano and Castro who were red-tagged before they were abducted.
“There have been so many people killed, forcibly disappeared, and illegally arrested, the very reason why the Supreme Court established the writ of amparo and habeas data. However, it seems that this is not considered in the decision made by the CA division,” Palabay said.
Palabay said that the CA decision has given the State perpetrators “a free pass by failing to conduct extraordinary due diligence via an investigation on the abduction and enforced disappearance of Jhed and Jonila – as we see in what many courts have done in the past.”
“This is the kind of court decisions that perpetuate the seemingly never-ending cycle of impunity in the country,” she added.
What the sole dissenting opinion states
Only Gaspar-Gito had dissenting opinion in the CA former Eighth Division on the petition of Tamano and Castro.
For Gaspar-Gito, the court must issue writ of amparo and writ of habeas data to the two women environmental defenders.
“The court’s duty to protect our bill of rights is constant – respecting the right to life is constant. As the ultimate guardian of the Constitution, this court is sworn to perform its solemn duty to defend and protect the constitution, which embodies the real sovereign will of the people,” Gaspar-Gito said in her dissenting opinion.
Gaspar-Gito believes that it is the State agents that are behind the abduction of the two. She noted the incident in June 2022 when the military went to the house of Castro’s parents encouraging them to convince Castro to surrender and give up being a member of the New People’s Army.
“This piece of information is crucial, considering that the kidnappers mentioned that they wanted to return the petitioners to their parents,” Gaspar-Gito said.
Gaspar-Gito also noted how State has failed to exercise extraordinary diligence to investigate and protect petitioners’ rights.
Gaspar-Gito cited the police’s refusal to let the parents of Castro file a police blotter report, to inquire about police investigation, and refusal to receive a form for “Inquiry into a Reported Disappeared Persons Whereabouts.” Receiving of such form by officials of any government agencies are mandated under the section 8 of the “Anti-Enforced or Involuntary Disappearance Act of 2012.?
She also said that there was no tracing done to the car used to abduct Tamano and Castro and had only settled with the verification/identification from the Land Transportation Office.
Gaspar-Gito is also not convinced in the testimonies of the State agents denying any knowledge of a certain “Kuya Bert” and “Ate Bea” who are supposed to help Tamano and Castro to surrender.
“Here, I find the turnover of petitioners from the captors (who took petitioners at Bataan) to be picked up by the 70th IB in Pampanga bafflingly smooth and convenient; yet the circumstances surrounding such transfer are rendered opaque by respondents’ lack of knowledge thereof. This unexplained gap in petitioners’ custody leads me to believe that Kuya Bert and Ate Bea, who supposedly helped petitioners surrender, are mere figments of imagination, created to befuddle the truth that the agents of the State are responsible for the petitioners’ abduction,” Gaspar-Gito said.
Gito-Gaspar also voted to grant the two the writ of habeas data. She noted how Assistant Director General of the National Security Council (NSC) “red-tagged and threatened to ‘slowly expose all of the information we have on the two.’”
“This clearly threatens petitioners’ right to privacy in life, liberty and security. Petitioners correctly argue that while ADG Malaya delimits the said information to their insistence that petitioners voluntarily surrendered, this does not necessarily mean that respondents do not hold other information regarding petitioners considering that they were forced to divulge sensitive personal information to their captors,” Gaspar-Gito said.
Meanwhile, Karapatan expressed support to Tamano and Castro and vowed to stand with them in their pursuit of justice and accountability.
“We demand that the NTF-ELCAC and the AFP be investigated and prosecuted for their crimes, as we reiterate our call for the abolition of the NTF-ELCAC,” Karapatan said. (RVO) 
