Philippines: Torturers and their ‘torture chambers’

A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission on the occasion of the UN International Day In Support of Victims of Torture

In Philippine society where people often know everyone in their communities, torture is known to be a common practice. People know who the torturers in their locality are, and where victims are taken to be tortured. Once a person is arrested and held, whether by the police or soldiers, being assaulted and beaten in crowded places is common and no longer shocks those witnessing such incidents. It has become a norm, for an arrested person–regardless of guilt or innocence–to face assault and torture in custody.

An average Filipino would have little doubt that torture victims are held and abused in police stations and military headquarters, safe houses or hideouts and the de facto detention centres (detention facilities not recognised as regular detention centres) under the control of the police or military. Numerous police stations and military camps have been confirmed by torture survivors to have been repeatedly used as places of torture. Such places are known not only to the torture survivors, but also by journalists who cover the police and military.

In fact, local television stations and investigative TV shows broadcast footage of arrestees whom the police either assaulted or allowed an angry mob to assault while in their custody. Newspapers also publish photographs and write lengthy articles of badly injured torture victims. The police and military no longer bother to cover-up such stories. They present torture victims, with visible traces or injuries on their bodies, to journalists at press conferences for publicity. They do so, knowing full well that they enjoy impunity from legal action.

This impunity does not stem from the failure of the judiciary, but from the protection of senior officers in the police and military establishments. A status quo of officers protecting one another is maintained to avoid prosecution, a by-product of a grossly misunderstood notion of ‘brotherhood’ and ‘camaraderie’ within the establishment. As long as the police and soldiers protect one another they are all safe. In reality, the police and military dictums “serve and protect” and “civilian supremacy” have become absurdities.

Torture victims in the Philippines are distinguished as either ‘political detainees’ or ‘common criminals’. The former are victims arrested and tortured due to their political activities, whether real or imagined. The latter, meanwhile, are victims who are not considered priorities. They are given no assistance in pursuing legal redress and prosecution should they choose to make complaints. They receive negligible, if any, attention. They have little opportunity of obtaining legal remedies and rehabilitation. Labelled as common criminals, they are not deserving of assistance because their crimes are a result of personal interest.

The Philippines has a long history of rebellion and insurgency, which can explain how the use of torture is seen as a political tool. The experience of the Filipinos during the colonial period for instance, when those who dissented and fought against the Spanish were tortured and executed by garrotting; or their experiences under oppressive regimes such as that of the late president Ferdinand Marcos, wherein torture was a tool to control and instil fear in order to cripple dissent.

While it is true that most ‘political detainees’ were tortured because of their membership to a political party and its activities, this is only one part of it. For years, the ultimate purpose of torture and violence had been maintaining the status quo and instilling fear to control society. A clear message was given that any deviation from the status quo, a way of life in which citizens are largely subordinated to the police and military, or any challenge to the authority of the security forces, would be dealt with by torture.

Whether they are ‘political detainees’ or ‘common criminals’, no distinction is made while they are being tortured however; both suffer similar experiences. Based on detailed accounts of torture victims, it can be said that the police and military use sophisticated methods they have mastered. While these methods might not be taught in any academy, there is definitely a culture of violence embedded within these institutions. This culture further develops within officers not only during their training, but also in response to media reporting and people’s acceptance of it in daily life.

This mindset explains the torture of ‘common criminals’, regardless of their guilt or innocent. In arresting ‘common criminals’, the police are not enforcing law and order, but punishing them for ‘breaking the law’, and for not submitting to the status quo–being law abiding citizens and submissive to persons in authority. Unlike political detainees, common criminals obtain less attention from local human rights groups and suffer from a lack of protection. None of the local organisations document cases of torture concerning ‘common criminals’.

In this way, a grossly misunderstood notion has developed, that human rights, particularly the right to be free from torture, only applies to political detainees and not to common criminals; nor to ordinary, poor persons. To get a certain level of protection therefore, ordinary people would have to affiliate themselves to a human rights or political organisation. Should they be arrested, tortured or have their rights violated, they would then have a person or group to go to. This has led to the adverse stereotyping of people as supporters of particular political groups.

Apart from ordinary civilians, even those working in the police and military establishments have endured violence and were themselves victims of torture before becoming fully pledged officers. The use of violence, psychological warfare, deprivation of food is the norm, on the pretext of strengthening the recruits’ ability to prepare for their careers. Those who cannot bear the extreme training have no choice but to quit. Deaths of recruits while undergoing training in academies or mysterious circumstances are not uncommon.

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is fully aware of the case of a promising and intelligent young man who quit the police academy due to unbearable training. He could have been a police major had he completed his training. For many weeks after quitting, he was emotionally and mentally disturbed due to his traumatic experience. Some of his senior cadets died while in training. He recalled having been deprived of food, and drinking water from the toilet bowl for days, with the knowledge and tacit consent of the superior officers or trainers. These inhuman practices have also played a part in turning police and military training academies into ‘torture chambers’.

This explains how police or soldiers become experts in torturing their victims; it begins from their own violent training. The drowning and suffocation simulation using plastics bags, blindfolding victims by wrapping their entire head with adhesive tape, inserting bullets between fingers and squeezing hard, the application of electric shocks on genitals and bodies, force-feeding victims excreta and urine, and forcing victims to dig a hole where they would be buried, are among the common acts of torture in the country. These acts were also used during Marcos’ dictatorial regime against political dissenters; the police and soldiers are experts at such acts.

The roots of torture and punishment also exist from pre-colonial Philippines, when any person guilty of committing a serious crime after trial (which today would be considered as lacking logic and unjust), is sentenced to death. Historical accounts of crime offenders note that thieves were subjected to a ‘Trial by Ordeal’, wherein their innocence or guilt would depend on their endurance of pain; dipping their hands into boiling water for instance. Also, during the Spanish and American colonial period, garrotting was systematically used to torture and execute criminals.

Today, torturers with past records of torturing victims become part of the government, they are elected as senators, promoted to higher police or military ranks, or are appointed to work in the government after retiring from law enforcement. Some of these are persons who were involved in torturing political dissidents during the Marcos regime. The total and continuing impunity these persons enjoy has resulted in the public lack of trust and confidence that perpetrators of crimes and abuses can be prosecuted.

In November 2009, the government made torture a criminal offence by enacting into law the Anti-Torture Act of 2009, after years of lobbying in which the AHRC also participated. Below is a profile of police stations and military headquarters where victims are tortured; these cases are but a fraction of those occurring in the country.

POLICE HEADQUARTERS, STATIONS:

Camp Rafael Crame
This is the national headquarters of the Philippine National Police (PNP) located in Quezon City, Metro Manila. It is a compound where key offices of the police, including the intelligence section, are stationed, as well as the residential quarters of top police officials. A victim claims he was tortured in this compound by police intelligence agents, following his arrest.
May 2007

Torture victim
Ricardo Ayeras accused the head of the PNP’s intelligence group and two others of torturing him while in custody inside their headquarters. He was interrogated in absence of legal counsel and threatened with death if he refused to admit his involvement in a bomb blast. After being missing for several days, his relatives only learned he was in police custody when he was presented to the media (AS-098-2007).

General Santos City Police Office
In every city they have their own police office. This police station is located in General Santos City in Mindanao. This city police office is under the direct control and supervision of the PNP national headquarters; however, the local chief executive also functions as an oversight. This police office is known for illegally and arbitrarily detaining, torturing and forcibly disappearing persons. None of the complaints against them made progress in any court of law.

April 2002
The policemen attached to this office arrested three men, Jejhon Macalinsal, Aron Salah and Abubakar Amilhasan, whom they falsely accused as being responsible for bombing a mall. The three were detained at the Pendatun Police Station (PP1), one of the local police stations in the city, for three months without arrest orders. While in police custody, Macalinsal a gay rights activist, was sexually harassed and humiliated. They also subjected him and his companions to repeated questioning, forcing them to admit they were responsible for the bomb blast (UA-74-2005).

December 2005
Haron Abubakar Buisan was arrested by the General Santos City police on another person’s stead in the same city. He was repeatedly kicked, beaten all over his body with stones and arbitrarily detained at the headquarters for three days without charges. At the time of arrest, the police did not present any arrests orders, explain the reasons for his arrest or the nature of charges against him (UA-251-2005).

April 2010
Another man, Anuar Hasim, was also arrested by the policemen attached to the same police headquarters. They tortured him in custody for seven days. He was severely beaten, suffocated with a plastic bag and had his left thumb burnt with lit cigarettes. The traces of torture were visible when he was visited by his wife, who took a photograph of them. When he was arrested, the policemen neither showed him the arrest orders nor explained to him the reasons for his arrest (AHRC-UAC-065-2010).