Over 93k online court hearings done across Philippines amid COVID-19 —SC official

More than 93,000 online court hearings have been conducted in the Philippines as the threat of COVID-19 transmission continues, Court Administrator Jose Midas Marquez said Thursday.

"As of September 22, we have around 93,469 online or videoconferencing hearings conducted by our courts nationwide with the success rate of around 87%," Marquez told senators during the budget hearing for the Judiciary's proposed P43.54 billion fund for 2021.

"We'd like to continue with this one for 2021 and onwards and we're also reviewing our court management systems and try to automate all those," he added.

The judiciary branch was appealing for an additional P6.58 billion budget in order to support  various targets including the creation of new positions, provision of hazard pay, and upgrading of internet connection in courts.

"Kasama rin po 'yun sa motion for reconsideration namin... We want to upgrade our bandwidth so that we can have better connectivity for our courts," Marquez said.

As of June 5, the SC said a total of 1,500 courts in the Philippines have been authorized to conduct hearings through videoconferencing.

The SC approved the guidelines on the use of videoconferencing technology for hearings among high-risk or seriously ill inmates in 2019. It was first tested in Davao City.

The courts in the country are also digitizing other processes amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We are doing away with the submission of manual report, lahat po electronic transmission na po from our courts to the Supreme Court," Marquez said.—AOL, GMA News