RTC judge orders Arroyo to release activist: Gov’t execs linked to Balao's disappearance

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet -- The Regional Trial Court-Branch 63 in a decision promulgated Jan. 19, the first on the writ of amparo found “substantial evidence” to link President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno, National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales, AFP Chief of Staff Gen. Alexander Yano, PNP Chief Jesus Versoza, Brig. Gen. Reynaldo Mapagu, Dir. Edgardo Doromal, Maj. Gen. Isagani Cachuela and Senior Supt. Eugene Martin to the abduction and continued disappearance of activist James Balao.

These government officials were the respondents in a petition for the issuance of the writ of amparo filed by the family and co-workers of James Balao in September 2008. Judge Benigno M. Galacgac penned the decision in this case.

The Court’s 13-page decision directed the respondents to “(a) disclose where James Balao is detained or confined, (b) to release James Balao considering his unlawful detention since his abduction and (c) to cease and desist from further inflicting harm upon his person.”

In reaching the decision, the court found Balao disappeared because of his “activist/political leanings.” Balao was a member of the militant Cordillera People’s Alliance when he was abducted at Barangay Tomay here last year.

The court also chided respondents for their “very limited, superficial, and one-sided” investigation on Balao’s enforced disappearance, and for using “technicalities and evidentiary jargon to thwart the petition to surface the activist.”

The court also recognized the need for President Arroyo to respond to a petition for the issuance of a writ of amparo.

The court supported this tack on the President’s own duty to be informed of the goings-on around her and to enforce the rule of law.

“By this decision, the President can be held accountable for every case of human rights abuse, especially enforced disappearances, even simply on the level of ensuring the reappearance of the disappeared,” said the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers- Cordillera.

“Through its independence and commitment to the rule of law, the court has pinned the responsibility for Balao’s disappearance and reappearance upon President Arroyo and her cohorts.”

The NUPL, in a statement however said there is need to find Balao. “We thus deplore the Court’s ruling to deny the interim reliefs prayed for, especially the issuance of an inspection order. An inspection order would have saved much time and effort in locating James Balao. Still, we are hopeful that the process of executing the decision pending appeal, with all ancillary reliefs, would reverse an otherwise empty victory. The Court has found and rightly so that James Balao is in the hands of the respondents. The Court must exercise its vast powers so that justice is done though the mighty respondents fall.”

The court said: The tribunals are the palladium of the civil liberties of the people. They are the sanctuary where the fundamental human rights are safeguarded. Shall we fail in the crucial hours of actual test? Shall we disappoint the unfortunate victim? This is the last asylum where the victim can resort to. Shall we reject him with freezing indifference? Here comes for salvation a drowning man. Shall we throw him to his doom? From the deepest bottom of our souls surges a powerful No, as an overpowering answer. No. We cannot do that. We must protect the victim. It is our unavoidable duty. It is an imperative mandate of the conscience.”