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Pangilinan aide: No attempt to keep Senate resolution vs. killing of minors from other senators


Senator Francis Pangilinan's office on Friday denied insinuations that seven senators were excluded from signing a Senate resolution he authored calling on the government to put an end to the killing of children and minors.

Senate Resolution 516 courted controversy earlier this week after the senators who did not sign the resolution bewailed remarks made by a group that labeled them as "Malacañang dogs" after they supposedly refused to endorse the resolution.

They are Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III, Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III, and Senators Richard Gordon, Gregorio Honasan II, Manny Pacquiao, Cynthia Villar and Juan Miguel Zubiri.

But as early as September 21, Pangilinan's office said they had sent the copy of the resolution endorsed by 16 senators to the office email of Gordon, Honasan, Villar, Zubiri, and Sotto.

"This was done to inform them about the resolution and to show the number of signatures, and to ask them if they want to sponsor it," said Pangilinan's chief of staff, lawyer Herminio Bagro III.

"Senator Gordon acknowledged receipt of the email on the same day," he said.

Pangilinan filed the resolution at 5:33 p.m. of September 25 and was read on the floor the next day, stating the title of the resolution and the names of the 16 co-authors.

"It should be noted that no one manifested desire to be a co-author of the measure. Senate President Pimentel referred it to the committee of Senators [Risa] Hontiveros and [Panfilo] Lacson," Bagro said.

"Clearly there was no attempt to keep or withhold the resolution from the seven senators. The Senate rules were followed. And most importantly, the Senate is showing that it cares to find justice for victims of all extrajudicial killings," he added.

Apart from a call to stop the killings, the resolution also sought for a Senate inquiry "in aid of legislation, to determine the institutional reasons, if any, that give rise to such killings."

The resolution cited the 1987 Constitution, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the Juvenile Justice Act, among other laws and international agreements, to argue that the state must ensure children are protected from abuse and their rights respected.

Citing data from the Children’s Legal Rights and Development Center, the resolution said at least 54 minors have been killed in police operations or vigilante-style killings since July 2016, the first month of the Duterte administration.

It said in many cases, the targets were not the children but the adults they were with. — Virgil Lopez/RSJ, GMA News

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