Contact Details

Rm. N-411, House of Representatives, Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines
+63 2 931 5497, +63 2 931 5001 local 7370

Press Statements

This is how Rep. Edcel C. Lagman, the lead petitioner in the first petition challenging the year long extension of martial law and suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in Mindanao, reacted to the 10-5 decision of the High Court validating the extension.

“When the majority of the justices of the Supreme Court fall in cadence with the President and the Congress in violating the Constitution, then the country is abandoned in the quagmire of tripartite derogation of the people’s civil liberties”, Lagman added.

Press Statements

The 30-day suspension of Overall Ombudsman Melchor Carandang by the Office of the President is a gross violation of the rule of law, which the Duterte administration habitually infringes.

Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales must remain steadfast in refusing to enforce the void suspension of her deputy which defies the final Supreme Court decision in the Gonzales case denying the President’s authority to discipline the Ombudsman’s deputies.

TV Appearances and Interviews

Unless reversed by the Supreme Court, the prevailing jurisprudence in Gonzales vs. Office of the President is that the President has no authority to remove, suspend, or discipline the deputies of the Ombudsman.

Without the said decision being first overturned, President Rodrigo Duterte is obligated to enforce and uphold its validity and efficacy, not to subvert it by suspending Overall Deputy Ombudsman Melchor Carandang.

Press Statements

The suspension of Overall Deputy Ombudsman Melchor Carandang by the Office of the President is a legal aberration, which, in the language of the Supreme Court in several decisions of similar import, is like “lawless thing that can be treated as an outlaw and slain on sight or ignored wherever and whenever it exhibits its head.”

President Rodrigo Duterte cannot defy prevailing jurisprudence and law that deny the President the power to impose disciplinary sanctions on the Ombudsman’s deputies.