“If there is a lawful reason why the directive cannot yet be implemented, the DOJ can simply explain it”
IN JULY 2017, Enrique Manas Sr. was killed in an ambush in Sta. Margarita, Samar. That same year, a criminal complaint for murder was filed against Emilio Zosa, Joel Calagos, Sofronio Meduranda Jr., Arturo Deborbon, and Reymart Antivo.
Today, almost nine years later, the case has yet to reach trial.
On January 16, 2025, then Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla issued a clear and categorical Resolution directing the Office of the Prosecutor General to file the necessary Information in court within ten days.
Ten days.
More than 400 days later, that directive remains unimplemented.
The issue raised by this situation goes beyond the details of a single criminal case. It raises a larger institutional question: when the Secretary of Justice issues a formal directive, does that order carry continuing authority, or does it quietly expire when leadership changes?
At the time the directive was issued, Fredderick Vida was serving as undersecretary at the Department of Justice. Today, he serves as Acting Justice Secretary and oversees the same department responsible for carrying out the order.
This places the matter squarely within his institutional responsibility.
To be clear, the question is not about guilt or innocence. That determination belongs exclusively to the courts. The DOJ conducts preliminary investigation only to determine whether probable cause exists and whether the case should proceed to trial.
In the Manas, Sr. case, the DOJ itself had already reached that point. The Remulla Resolution explicitly reinstated an earlier prosecutorial finding and directed that the case be filed in court.
The 2025 Resolution also emphasized that evidentiary questions, including alibis, denials, and technical rules, are matters best resolved during trial, not during preliminary investigation.
In other words, the DOJ had already determined that the proper forum for resolving the case was a courtroom.
It is worth recalling that during his tenure as Justice Secretary Remulla raised the internal standards of prosecution.
Prosecutors were instructed not to rely on bare probable cause alone but to assess whether the available evidence could reasonably lead to conviction in court. The intention was to avoid weak cases and restore confidence in the prosecutorial process.
In that context, the Remulla Resolution carried more than routine administrative weight. It meant that the Department’s top official, applying a higher prosecutorial threshold, believed the evidence warranted a full trial.
If that directive now remains unimplemented, the institutional question becomes unavoidable: does the present leadership of the DOJ, now headed by Vida, share that assessment—or has the Department quietly stepped back from the judgment reached under Remulla’s watch?
Across the country, thousands of criminal complaints move slowly through the justice system. Many families lack the resources to sustain years of litigation.
That is why the implementation of departmental orders matters. When a formal directive remains unexecuted for long periods without explanation, it creates uncertainty not only for the parties directly involved but also for the broader public that depends on the credibility of institutions.
Human nature understands that legal processes take time. But delay that occurs after a final administrative directive is more difficult to understand.
At that point, the question naturally arises: what exactly is preventing movement? Is there a legal impediment? A procedural obstacle? Or something else?
In the absence of a clear explanation, speculation inevitably fills the vacuum. People begin to wonder whether unseen pressures, political sensitivities, or influential interests might be at play. Whether such suspicions are justified or not, they thrive whenever institutions fail to communicate openly about their actions.
Transparency, therefore, becomes essential.
If there is a lawful reason why the directive cannot yet be implemented, the DOJ can simply explain it.
Public institutions strengthen credibility when they clarify their processes. But if there is no legal barrier, then the responsibility becomes equally straightforward: the order must be carried out.
The family of Enrique Manas Sr. is not asking the DOJ to declare anyone guilty. What they are asking is far more basic: that the DOJ follow through on its own directive.
The question now confronting the Department is simple but important.
Do departmental orders continue to carry force after they are issued? Or do they quietly expire with the secretaries who sign them?
Institutions are ultimately judged not by the resolutions they write, but by the resolutions they implement. (Email: ernhil@yahoo.com)
