NAAWAN, Misamis Oriental (MindaNews / 15 August) – The action star turned Senator, Robin Padilla, is pushing a bill to reduce the age of criminal responsibility to 10, seeking to amend Republic Act No. 9344, known as the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act of 2006. Said law establishes a comprehensive framework for the treatment of children in conflict with the law in the Philippines, pegging at 15 as the age for children to become criminally responsible.
The Senator is reviving the aborted obsession of his benefactor and patron, former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte, to lower the age for criminal responsibility in the advent of his war on drugs.
Then President Duterte claimed that the minimum age of 15 for criminal responsibility under the Juvenile and Justice Welfare Act of 2006 is responsible for the rise in criminality and for producing generations of young people committing drug-related crimes, protected by said law.
Accordingly, children as young as 6 – 8 are the ones virtually maintaining and sustaining the drug trade, serving as runners, guides to drug dens, keeping and supplying the needed drugs for the users. The President’s claim was based on PNP and PDEA reports that in drug stings, such young children were, indeed, found being used in the commerce of illegal drugs.
The proposed measure of lowering the age for criminal responsibility is purportedly designed to protect children from being used by syndicates. Under Duterte’s watch and bidding, then House justice committee chair Oriental Mindoro 1st District Rep. Paulino Salvador Leachon proposed to peg the age even lower at 9 for child offenders to become criminally responsible.
The lawmakers and enforcers are off-tangent and out of focus.
If children are used by syndicates, the imperative is to protect, not to persecute them, and to demolish instead the syndicates. The assault should not be made on the young victims. But no less than the President of the Republic attributed to and blamed the helpless children for the proliferation and success in the commerce of illegal drugs. They have to pay.
The mistake is grave, and the consequences are unpardonable.
Kids in conflict with the law, once considered criminally responsible, are easy targets. The dark alleys will soon be littered with their bodies as the war on drugs shifts attention to them.
It is myopic and insane to believe that the drug menace will end once the little feet are stopped from running.
It was claimed that the legislation is to protect children from criminal syndicates. Who will and how? If the kids involved in the commerce of illegal drugs are hunted as criminals by state security forces, whom shall they turn to?
The proposed legislation, now revived by Padilla, is anti-children and anti-poor.
It is doubtful that at the age of 10, children already possess the capacity for informed and reasoned judgment, the adult’s weapon or tool in confronting the world, which experience developed over time. The lack of experience in children makes them easy prey to their impulses and the allures in the environment that are perceived to satisfy their needs and wants. This deficiency in the tender age of 10 may not allow kids to fully divine the consequences of their acts.
If poor adult offenders are disadvantaged and helpless in their encounter with the justice system, poor and ignorant child offenders may suffer worse.
If the poor kids survived the pursuit, they will be traumatized by the entire process and measures of keeping criminals away from society.
Wealthy adult and child offenders, on the other hand, have quick and easy access to the ways and means to avoid the trauma that poor offenders are bound to suffer. Their talented and well-connected counsels can quash and erase the crimes of the rich and make them whole and spotless again.
Lowering the age of criminal responsibility to 10 has no scientific, juridical, social, or traditional basis. At 10, a citizen in this country cannot be issued a driver’s license, is not allowed to exercise suffrage, to get married, or enter into a contract because he is not considered mature enough to make sound judgment and assume responsibilities.
The proponents of amending the Juvenile Justice Act of 2006 believe otherwise, that is, kids at 10 or 12 are already discerning and shall therefore be responsible for their acts. If this is how our lawmakers are thinking, and to be consistent, they might as well revise our laws regarding citizen rights, privileges, and responsibilities, and allow kids at 10 or 12 to enjoy what the adults enjoy, say, to drive cars in our roads, and allow them to vote and even to marry if they so desire.
(MindaViews is the opinion section of MindaNews. William R. Adan, Ph.D., is retired professor and former chancellor of Mindanao State University at Naawan, Misamis Oriental.)
