Press Release
February 13, 2009

Pimentel presents proposal to solve absence of working courts in Sulu

Believe it or not. In this time and age, not a single municipal trial court is operating in the l8 municipalities of Sulu.

And although Sulu is entitled to four regional trial courts, not one is sitting in the multi-island province on a regular basis. The judges, more often than not, hold sessions in Zamboanga City in the main island of Mindanao.

The judges are afraid to hold office and conduct trials in Sulu due to the unstable law and order situation there.

To solve this acute problem, Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) is proposing a law granting a set of incentives to attract qualified judges to accept permanent appointments to and hold regular sessions in the province and municipalities concerned.

The minority leader said that the incentives should also cover the court employees and the prosecutors concerned.

As embodied in Senate Bill 3062 filed by Pimentel, the incentives involve doubling the salaries, emoluments, allowances and perks for judges assigned to Sulu and other equally hazardous areas.

In addition, the said judges shall be provided security detail of not less than five but not more than seven police officers or elements of the armed forces.

The costs of maintaining the security detail shall be shared in equal amounts by and shall be taken from the budgets of the judicial department and the province concerned in the case of the Regional Trial Courts.

However, the bill provides that the judges of all levels of trial courts assigned to Sulu and other local government units with similar security problems shall be entitled to the package of incentives only if they sit and hold regular court sessions in their places of assignment.

In the event that the judges so assigned to these perilous posts get killed in the line of duty, the bill provides that their heirs shall receive double the benefits that the heirs of judges who are assigned in other places are entitled to under the law.

Without any courts operating in Sulu, Pimentel said there is no effective judicial remedy to redress the grievances of the people of Sulu.

"The appalling absence of trial courts in Sulu and its municipalities bespeaks the troublous times besetting Sulu," the senator from Mindanao said.

"Without trial courts to arbitrate grievances according to the Rule of Law, the Rule of the Gun will prevail as it seems to prevail today in the province. Serious threats to the security and the safety of the populace of Sulu, including kidnappings, abductions, ambuscades and outright killings, appear to be horrendously common place in the province."

Senate Bill 3062 also states that judges who are assigned in Sulu and other hazardous areas may not be temporarily detailed or permanently transferred elsewhere without the consent of the judges and the LGUs concerned.

In the event that they are temporarily detailed or permanently transferred to other places with their consent and that of the LGUs concerned, they shall no longer enjoy the incentives

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