Palace ready to defend extended ML in Mindanao
MANILA — Malacañang yesterday said it is ready to face the Supreme Court to defend President Rodrigo Duterte’s extended martial law powers across Mindanao, after opposition lawmakers challenged the prolonged declaration before the tribunal.
With 240-27 vote at a joint session, it took Congress less than half a day to approve Duterte’s request to extend martial law in Mindanao until December 31, 2018 and arrest suspected rebels there without charge.
“The legal and factual bases of the martial law extension have been clearly established based on the security assessment by our ground commanders,” presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement. “We are thus prepared to defend our position before the High Court,” he added.
In a petition, opposition congressmen led by Edcel Lagman of Albay have turned to the SC for help in contesting Congress’ decision to allow Duterte to extend martial law in Mindanao for a year.
The petitioners said there is no actual rebellion in Mindanao to justify the second extension of martial law, adding that prolonging military rule by another year “defies the unequivocal intent and mandate of the Constitution of having a limited duration of martial law and its extension.”
The Constitution does not allow a series of extensions or reextensions of a martial law proclamation, which may lead to “extensions in perpetuity,” Lagman and his colleagues argued.
But Roque countered that the petitioners’ allegations of unlimited martial law extensions were “mere surmises and conjectures and not supported by law and the Constitution.” He said: “Martial law in perpetuity is a scenario that neither the President, Congress or the Supreme Court will allow as it is patently unconstitutional.”
On May 23, Duterte imposed martial law in Mindanao after the principal Islamic city of Marawi was stormed by heavily-armed, homegrown extremists who pledged allegiance to ISIS.
In July, Congress overwhelmingly voted to prolong military rule in Mindanao until yearend after the proclamation reached its 60-day constitutional limit, giving Duterte more time to stabilize the strifetorn region where ISIS was gaining influence.
In a rousing address to troops last October, Duterte declared Marawi liberated from terrorists after five months of fighting that gave state forces their first taste of urban warfare.
Philstar.com