"Not many people can do his job."
In his previous life, Harry Roque was a crusading lawyer fighting for the underprivileged and the powerless. He taught constitutional law and fought for those whose human rights had been trampled upon.
Many of us can still remember his passionate service to the family of transgender Jennifer Laude, who was killed by an American Marine, Joseph Scott Pemberton, at a motel in Olongapo City, in October 2014. It was established in court that Pemberton had dunked Laude’s head into the toilet until she drowned, and then had broken her neck.
Pemberton was found guilty of homicide and then sentenced to 10 years in prison.
But last week an Olongapo court ordered Pemberton’s release on the strength of calculations of Good Conduct Time Allowance. In reaction, Roque said Laude’s death was "symbolic of the death of the Philippines' sovereignty." It was judicial overreach, he said, because the determination of GTCA credits was an executive function.
“Where else have you seen anything like this, where the crime happened in the Philippines, the victim was Filipino, yet we did not get to hold Pemberton while the case was being litigated, and now, while we symbolically hold him, American soldiers still guard him?” he asked.
On Monday night, however, President Duterte himself announced that he was granting an absolute pardon to Pemberton. The soldier had not been treated fairly, the President said. It was a move that reportedly surprised Pemberton’s lawyer and the US Embassy.
We wondered briefly how Mr. Roque would defend the decision of the man he is supposed to be speaking for, seeing how unpopular, ill-conceived and insulting it was to Filipinos. We wondered too how he would take the developments that were so starkly against his personal views.
And, as he always has, Roque tried to do his job. True to form, his comment on the pardon toed the administration line.
We can’t say we are surprised. The spokesman does not seem to be the kind of person who would leave his post out of principle or delicadeza. In fact, this is not the first time he has changed his tune about issues of importance—he used to fight on behalf of fishermen in the West Philippine Sea, and of the families of slain journalists. Lately, he has had to make inane statements about boosting Filipinos’ mental health by giving them a view of a white-sand beach, even though the sand is synthetic and is a health hazard.
Not many people can be Harry Roque. It takes a special kind of person to stomach the conflicts he must be dealing with. We wish, however, that the presidential spokesman’s time was spent on less polarizing issues—say, explaining the administration’s science-based and well-thought out plan to get us out of this public health crisis—instead of on controversial issues that won’t even be addressed at the core and will be forgotten as soon as the next big story comes along.