If Proposed Laws Are Passed, Nine-year Old Children Could be Hanged
by Fr Shay Cullen
Preda Boys Home
A few weeks ago, the Philippine nation and the world that cares for children’s rights and human dignity learned that the new speaker of the House of Representatives of the Philippine Congress has filed two proposed laws that will lower the age of criminal liability for children in conflict with the law to nine years old and reintroduce the death penalty by hanging.
This is draconian and oppressive for children and not worthy of the Duterte administration and the Philippine people. The children are innocent, most are illiterate, abandoned, neglected and failed by society and government. The children younger than 15 are being used by criminals to commit crimes because they cannot be prosecuted, proponents of the law say. This is baloney.
If it is true that they are being used (there is no research data or evidence to support it), the children are controlled, used and exploited by criminals and cannot act with free will or be held liable for wrongdoing. So, what’s the point of criminalizing them? The children are scapegoats of uncaring authorities and an indifferent society.
The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) through the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Council, has strongly opposed such a move to criminalize children and the civil society is also adamantly against it.
The Catholic Church has strongly spoken against the death penalty and we wait for a statement from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines to support the retention of the 15-years-old age of liability for children. It is very wrong to blame children for the crimes of adults.
Full post here.