The

Human Rights Situation of Muslims in Metro Manila: The Experience of Muslim Legal Assistant Foundation, Inc. By: Algamar A. Latiph In the afternoon of 7 January 2005, Alim Aguam decided to pray at the Islamic Information Center, Malate, Manila. He chose IIC because it was near the Malacanang Palace, where he was invited to a dinner and was tasked to lead a duwaah (prayer) later that evening. Alim Aguam is one of the most respected Muslim scholars in the Philippines. He was among the 16 worshipers praying in IIC Prayer Room. The worshipers were kneeling when suddenly, they were forcibly pushed from behind, face shoved to the floor, their hands tied tightly with plastic handcuff until they became totally immobilized by men in civilian cloths. The arresting operatives were from the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group of the Philippine National Police. The 16 were immediately tagged as terrorists relating to the Black Nazarene Feast later that week. Few hours after, 11 of them were released by CIDG. The remaining 5 were charged for illegal possession of firearms and explosives. After a few months, they were declared innocent. Without arrest or search warrant and without reasonable cause, policemen disregarded rule of law, invaded the sanctity of the place of worship and deprived them of liberty. The arrest led to the formation of the Muslim Legal Assistance Foundation, Inc. It subsequently filed criminal and civil cases against 25 police officers before the Office of Ombudsman. The criminal case prevented the promotion of the arresting officers for years since promotion requires clearance from Ombudsman. The MUSLAF is a public interest and human rights group organized by and composed of Muslim lawyers. It was established to address human rights violations against Moro. It was founded upon the promotion,

fulfillment and protection of human rights. The Philippine Constitution and international convention on human rights is the legal framework utilized by MUSLAF in pursuing its objectives. The establishment of MUSLAF is seen as a welcome development in protecting, fulfilling and promoting human rights, as there is no Muslim organization of lawyers that focus on human rights at that time. There were similar arrests preceding the arrests in IIC. Tagging innocent Muslims were normal occurrence. There was increase in the incidence of arrests and congestion of jails in the main cities involving Moro relating to illegal search and seizure transpired during buy-bust operations. Ethnic and religious-based discrimination was prevalent but there is no legal mechanism to effectively address this issue. There is also the problem of internally displace persons brought in the conflict areas in Mindanao. There were other forms of human rights violations prevailing but MUSLAF focused only on rule of law, equality before the law, anti- discrimination, due process, illegal arrests and searches, jail decongestion, legal education, legal counseling, litigation, advocacy, networking with other legal organizations and agencies of the government local and international among others. It undertakes to investigate human rights violations, provide legal advice and assistance if necessary, and lobby for legislation that advances human rights. Addressing Human Rights Violations Preventive rather than curative is the approach and strategy adopted by MUSLAF in dealing with human rights violation. Meaning MUSLAF should prevent an imminent human rights violation at its initial stage. For instance, zoning utilized by law enforcers. It is an operation in which an area is cordoned off while homes within are searched and suspects arrested. Law enforcers would line-up suspected persons and persons with criminal records.

There is an imminent violation of human rights in this method of arrest since no criminal case has been filed against the person to be arrested. The person arrested will later be charged upon being booked in the police station. Zoning which obviously an initial step to carry out illegal arrest should be avoided. It is the policy of MUSLAF to its paralegal to report immediately when a zoning occurs, so that lawyer can promptly act and prevent policemen from making illegal arrests. The problem confronted by MUSLAF is lack of availability of lawyer in the earliest stage of zoning and failure of the victims to report it promptly. In the case buy-bust-operation, lawyers cannot be expected to be present during the arrest. However, MUSLAF developed a legal technique to address this gap. The arrested person will be assisted to prepare a Complaint-Affidavit against the arresting officers for criminal offenses of illegal arrest and arbitrary detention. When the arrested person is presented to the Prosecutor during Inquest, he will present the complaint to the Prosecution. The arresting officers sometimes negotiate for the withdrawal of the complaint against the detained persons; they asked for compromise that they would not press charges as long as the arrested complainant will not file the complaint. For those cases already in Court, MUSLAFs recourse is to proceed with the trial and to file criminal cases against the arresting officers. Most of the time, the accused is hesitant to file an action against the police officers. Litigation and Representation MUSLAF provides legal advice and representation to Moro especially to detainees by providing free legal services to prisoners, legal consultations for them and their families. However, the legal service is still limited owing to lack of volunueeterism of other Muslim lawyers. There was intiative for a Memorandum of Agreement with the National Commission on Muslim Filipino intended to subsidize legal fees of MUSLAF lawyers to make it more attractive for Muslim lawyers to volunteer. Financial support will be given to lawyers who handle cases. The NCMF is mandated under its Charter to provide legal assistance to Moro but since it

lacks lawyers to discharge this function, MUSLAF lawyers can be deputized by NCMF and, accordingly, provide reasonable allowances. In this arrangement, MUSLAF can attract Muslim lawyers without being full-time lawyer. Lawyers can have control of their time. They can render legal service at their own terms without compromising the legal service rendered to indigent clients. There will be more felixibility in this arrangement and this will address MUSLAFs problem of lack of lawyers. Jail Decongestion Project The priority of MUSLAF is to ensure that it is not merely a service oriented organization but rather a resource for the community to address human rights violations. One of the target projects of MUSLAF is to provide legal aid to Moro who are languishing in various jails in Metro Manila. The project seeks to contribute to existing efforts to decongest the various jails in the country by extending legal assistance to Moro. The main objective is to provide adequate and competent legal service to Moro detainees who may be eligible for release and to set up paralegal coordinators among the detainees. The jail decongestion was successful at first. But lack of lawyers and personnel and finance led to the demise of the project. The situation of female Muslim detainees is peculiar. A survey of the detainees show that most of them are marginalized in terms of employment, have low levels of education, and were arrested without warrants. A significant percentage of the detainees came to Manila to seek employment abroad, or are ex-abroad, and hence do not have relatives here to assist them in their cases. Most are also married and with children waiting for their return in their respective homes. This holds true in the case of minors. In Quezon City Female Dormitory in Camp Karingal, it was severely congested. It has an ideal capacity of only 200 persons but there are around 621 detainees inside the dorms as of January 2006. Moro detainees comprise 18% of the total detainees. This ration is exceedingly abnormal if

we compare the ratio of Moro women vis--vis non-Moro population in Quezon City. The project emphasizes inter-agency co-operation, capacity development and institutional innovation towards solving the problems affecting detainees in Quezon City. Collaboration with the agencies administering criminal justice may enable an immediate reduction of the numbers of persons awaiting trial as a proportion of the prison population, while at the same time building the attitudes, skills and organizational capacities of the concerned agencies. The project also emphasizes promoting legal literacy in various communities. Legal Literacy in Communities MUSLAF also initiated legal education in the community. It trained paralegals among members of the community within Metro Manila as early as 2007 but it was only short live. MUSLAF conducted legal literacy seminars in selected communities. Since MUSLAF lawyers are not expected to be present at the time that human rights violations are being committed, it is but appropriate that communities are empowered by capacitating their members. They were trained with the basic law on arrests and searches and other common human rights violations. However, the trained community members are still unable and ineffective to assert and prevent human rights violations committed by law enforcers. Policemen used force and intimidation against the paralegals and threatened their arrests. Some of the trained members are not rendering help because of community politics. Other members do no bother to assist at all. Jail Visitation MUSLAF conducted regular visits to the detainees in order to ensure that basic living conditions and situations are adequate. It also offered legal

counseling to detainees and their families in order to ensure that they understand their rights and are able to address violations. Documentation of Moro Detainees MUSLAF had documented statistics concerning the numbers of detainees, date and place of arrest, and any violations suffered by detainees as well as demographic data. But only a jail facility in Quezon City was recorded and invenotoried. Again, this is due to lack of funding. Setting up of Paralegal Coordinators in Detention Facility MUSLAF believes that to empower the detainees themselves, they should also be informed about the basics of legal procedure, and that some of them may be developed as paralegal coordinators. The same paralegal training should also be provided to their relatives or friends in their respective communities so that they will not be in the dark as regards the judicial process. Linkages and Coordination MUSLAF coordinated closely with the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) for its endorsement of the activities to be conducted. It also networked with other agencies that the MUSLAF has to coordinate with: Public Attorneys Office, courts, Philippine National Police, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, Commission on Human Rights, and Non- Government Organizations and the Integrated Bar of the Philippines Quezon City Chapter. Executive Clemency Project Convicted prisoners can shorten their term of imprisonment by virtue of executive clemency. This project needs time and manpower in order to study qualified prisoners and its endorsement for executive clemency first to the Board of Pardon, then to the Office of the President. This project is in its conceptual stage and yet to be implemented.

Capacity-Building for MUSLAF Lawyers Mandatory Continuing Legal Education is not updated with the new trends on human rights practice and pleading. Human rights lawyering is not taught in formal education and it is not a mainstream lawyering. There are limited resources to teach volunteers lawyers in the field. Although, MUSLAF is an independent and self-sufficient legal organization it has its limited resources to sponsor capability building for its legal team. Monitor state compliance with international treaties MUSLAF has yet to institute a mechanism to monitor the Philippines compliance with international treaties on human rights. But again MUSLAFs lack of resources make it unable to perform this project. Reaching the Broadest Constituents There are issues, which NHRIs must proactively reach out to vulnerable and disadvantaged persons. Unconventional channels of communication should be used as needed to ensure that all groups in society are reached. Public Information, Documentation and Research MUSLAF aims to provide, as far as practicable, information and documentation in printed form or Internet. Report and Evaluation MUSLAF should provide an effective evaluation mechanism to assess its programs and activities so that it continuously improves its legal services. It should include, among others, annual reports and program of action for the next coming year. As much as possible, it should include both qualitative and quantitative analysis. It must also conduct an annual strategic planning exercise to establish targets and goals. Goals should be measurable and should be realistic.