Prison Advocates Oppose Restoration of Death Penalty

MANILA, Oct. 12, 2010-Prison advocates continuously fight against the re-establishment of death penalty in the Philippines.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines- Episcopal Commission on Prison Pastoral Care (CBCP-ECPPC) has joined with the Coalition Against Death Penalty (CADP) in opposing the restoration of the death penalty law in the country.

The group presented the rules and regulation of the restorative justice and some alternatives to imprisonment.

"We offer the tenets of restorative justice that while our justice system seeks to punish the wrongdoer, it should move beyond punishment and seek healing of all stakeholders, the victim, the offender and the society we all live in," said Rodolfo Diamante, Executive Secretary of ECPPC and Vice-President of CADP.

They also called on other prison advocates to join them in recommending the alternative way of keeping peace in the community and generating an enabling environment to prevent criminality.

The statement was released in time for the observance of the "World Day against the Death Penalty"  last October 10, 2010.

Diamante also said that any deprivation of life will not incur justice for anyone.

"We stand by our belief that any deprivation of the right to life will not gain justice for all. Rendering the death penalty as a means to obtain justice simply does the opposite as recent history has proven," he said.

"The death penalty has not deterred criminality and has even spurred more injustice by killing the innocent, those wrongly accused, those without proper defense and those who have been deprived of the opportunity to reform and restore the injury they caused others. This is because ours is a system of justice replete with human errors," he added.

They also asked the "foreign missions to save the lives of overseas Filipinos in the gallows, languishing in death row." (Kate Laceda)