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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Calida defends martial law extension

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The Office of the Solicitor General on Tuesday asked the Supreme Court to dismiss the petition filed by opposition lawmakers led by Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman, insisting the legality of the extension of martial law in Mindanao.

In a 50-page comment, Solicitor General Jose Calida argued the anti-martial law petition should be dismissed for lack of merit.

Calida said the factual bases to extend the duration of the martial law in Mindanao under Proclamation No. 216 for another year or until December 2019 still existed, contrary to allegations of petitioners.

Solicitor General Jose Calida

According to him, rebellion, a key requirement for declaration of martial law under the Constitution, persisted in Mindanao.

The chief state lawyer cited the official report from the Armed Forces that cited “ongoing rebellion of the Daesh-Inspires groups and its local and foreign allies, particularly the Daulah Islamiyah and also of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army forces in Mindanao.”

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He revealed that the “Daesh-inspired groups have shifted their strategy from establishing a Wilayat to global insurgency or rebellion” and that “they continue their recruitment and radicalization activities teaching their new members how to launch deadlier attacks and to sow chaos and instability that will extremely endanger the public.”

He said: “Based on the AFP’s end of first semester data, the Abu Sayyaf Group has a total of 424 members with 473 firearms. 

“They are scattered all over Basilan, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi and Zamboanga covering 138 barangays. The Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters has 264 members with 254 firearms and affecting 50 barangays. “The DI has a reach of 16 barangays and is composed of 59 members of the Maute group with 61 firearms, 6 members of the Maguid Group with 10 firearms, and 85 members of the Turaifie Group with 20 firearms. The total barangays affected are 204.” 

Calida also cited the attacks by the said groups from January to December last year as well as the “consistent influx of foreign terrorists in the country who are primarily responsible for the conduct of trainings to local terrorist fighters, especially in making improvised explosive devices and motivating locals to serve as suicide bombers.” 

Besides the terrorist groups, he also cited the ongoing rebellion of the CPP-NPA and their attacks in Mindanao last year. 

“In the present case, it is apparent that the NPA continues to rise publicly and take up arms against the Government. From Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2018, there have been a total of 369 NPA-initiated violent incidents. 193 of these were committed in Mindanao alone,” read the comment.

With these data, Calida argued that the extension of martial law for another year was necessary to provide public safety in Mindanao.

He pointed out that the cessation of Marawi siege and President Rodrigo Duterte’s announcement in October 2017 that the war-torn city was already liberated from terrorists could not be the sole basis to lift the martial law proclamation. 

The chief state lawyer said the argument of petitioners that martial law already served its purpose when the Marawi siege ended was already rebutted by the High Court in its earlier ruling on the second extension of the proclamation.

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