Church calls for alternatives to 'death penalty'

As the Philippines hosts an international meet on prison reforms, the Catholic Church has reaffirmed its stand against the death penalty and issued the call for alternatives to the country's "punitive criminal justice system." The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said the country has to adopt more "restorative" rather than "punitive" measures against prisoners. Rodolfo Diamante, executive secretary of the CBCP Episcopal Commission on Prison Pastoral Care (ECPPC), said the government has to pass legislation that would enhance the dignity of the prisoners. The ECPPC heads the meet of the International Commission of Catholic Prison Pastoral Care from October 25 to 29 in Cavite to discuss ways to “encourage a greater awareness of the prison pastoral care among the faithful and society." According to a news report on the CBCP website, the ECPPC also spearheaded the 23rd Prison Awareness Week, with the theme “Towards Justice That Moves Beyond Punishment," from October 19 to 24. “We stand by our belief that the deprivation of the right to life will not gain justice for all," Diamante said in a statement. “History has proven that rendering the death penalty as a means to obtain justice simply does the opposite — the death penalty will only lead to the wider spread and longer persistence of injustice in the country," he noted. Diamante said the Philippine justice system was "replete with human errors," and that “the death penalty has not deterred criminality." “Instead, it has even spurred more injustice by killing the innocent — those wrongly accused and without proper defense," he added. “These people have been deprived of the opportunity to reform and restore the injury they caused others," Diamante said in a statement posted on the CBCP website. Restorative justice Diamante reiterated the church’s call for the country’s justice system to transcend from being merely “punitive" to being “restorative". “While our justice system seeks to punish the wrongdoer, it should move beyond punishment and seek healing of all people involved — the victim, the offender and the society we all live in," he said. He also called on prison reform advocates to join the Catholic church in recommending alternative ways of keeping peace in the community and creating an enabling environment to prevent criminality. The Philippines banned the death penalty for all crimes in the 1987 Constitution. However an outbreak of kidnappings, killings and coup de etat in the 1980s prompted lawmakers to restore capital punishment. In late June 2006, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo signed a law repealing the death penalty, sparing the lives of an estimated 1,200 people on death row. However, the recent spate of violence, mostly in Mindanao, has prompted calls — many from prominent figures — for the death penalty to be reimposed. Bukidnon Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri recently reiterated his call for the reimposition of the death penalty following the recent acts of violence recorded in Mindanao. Zubiri said the perpetrators of the bombing as well as the rape of a nurse in Maguindanao should be meted the death penalty. Studies by the Amnesty International in 1999 showed that almost 90 percent of Filipinos believe that the death penalty is a deterrent to crime, although that figure is believed to have been halved by anti-death penalty information campaigns. - DM, VVP, GMANews.TV