EVEN before the 19th Congress convenes, incoming Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri yesterday already doused cold water on the proposal to revive the death penalty for drug traffickers, saying this is not a priority measure of the Marcos administration.
“I already asked the higher ups, hindi naman nila ipa-prioritize ito (they will not prioritize [the reimposition of death penalty]),” Zubiri said after Sen. Ronald del Rosa refiled his bill proposing the reimposition of the capital punishment for convicted large-scale drug traffickers.
Zubiri also said he is personally against the measure.
“I will not support, for example, the death penalty or any bills that will infringe on the human rights of the innocent. Anti-abortion din ako (I am also anti-abortion). I will not agree on abortion measures,” he said.
In filing his proposed bill, Dela Rosa expressed confidence that this will be approved by the Senate committee on justice and human rights, which will be the panel that will handle discussions on the measure, because its incoming chairman, Sen. Francis Tolentino, is “not anti-death penalty.”
Aside from Dela Rosa, Sen. Christopher Go has also indicated his plan to file a measure for the death penalty, proposing that it be imposed on drug and plunder convicts.
Measures seeking the revival of the capital punishment was pushed to the backburner during the last Congress as the chairman of the Senate committee, former senator Richard Gordon, was against its reimposition.
Dela Rosa first filed his proposal in 2019 after he won in the 2019 senatorial race.
