Recently, the Anti-Torture Act of 2009 was signed into law. The 14th Congress needs to be congratulated for passing a law that is long overdue and took almost 10 years to enact. However human rights victims, including myself, cannot yet celebrate. The importance and relevance of this law to our lives remain to be seen. It is just a piece of paper unless enforced and tested in court. It will not achieve its intended purpose of protecting individual and human rights unless civil society or Filipinos assert their rights under the law and prosecute abusive and cruel law enforcement and military personnel; and unless the guilty are punished for their heinous crimes.

The officials of the law enforcement agencies and the military cannot be expected to lead in the new law?s enforcement considering the fact that some of their peers, if not they themselves, are directly involved in the human rights violations. Therefore, it is important for the legal profession and human rights organizations to lead the way; collect the cases of human rights abuses and test the new law in court, otherwise the law will be useless and the benefits that the law seeks for society will not be realized. Filipinos can only blame themselves if this happens. The ball is now in the hands of civil society.

Many of the human rights abuses, horror crimes, are committed undercover and then kept from the public as ?Classified Information? or ?Top Secret.? The code of silence among law enforcement and military personnel has to be broken. The national government should be more transparent with its citizens. Congress must pass the Freedom of Information Act to provide additional legal instrument for the successful prosecution of human rights violators, and for citizens to get the protection of the law.

The human rights struggle in the Philippines has not reached a landmark point yet. The difficult struggle must continue. Congress needs to be prompted to pass the Freedom of Information Act now.

?BERNARDO D. MORANTTE JR., MD,
23 Mt. Fairweather St.,
Filinvest 1, Quezon City