SEN. Richard J. Gordon shrugged off a threat by protesting motorcycle riders to go to court for declaratory relief to suspend enforcement of the newly enacted Motorcycle Crime Prevention Law principally authored by Gordon.
Gordon voiced confidence that the “well-researched law”—Republic Act 11235 recently signed by President Duterte— can withstand judicial scrutiny.
“This is a free country,” Gordon said on Wednesday, adding: “Hence, rider groups could go to the courts anytime if they believe there is a need to do so.”
“This passed through two chambers of Congress. Hearings were held. President Duterte is also a biker, but he signed it because he understands the purpose of the law, is to protect the public against riding-in-tandems who kill or rob people,” Gordon said in Filipino.
Still, the chairman of the Committee on Justice and Human Rights said, while the bikers have every right to go to court, it’s not him, but the public that will lose because “this is the first time that the government will take action against riding-in-tandem criminals.”
Gordon recalled reports that “riding-in-tandem criminals have been a plague for this country for the past 15 years and constitute one of the biggest contributors to EJK [extrajudicial killings] that everybody is complaining about.”
The Motorcycle Rights Organization earlier announced plans to file for declaratory relief against the law, but only when they have already seen the implementing rules and regulations. “They claimed to have enough ammunition to prove before the courts that the passage of the recently signed law was unconstitutional and railroaded,” he added.
“How do we give justice to the thousands of victims of riding-in-tandems? This law offers a solution. We will reduce the opportunity to kill or rob people with impunity using riding-in-tandems. Because we will have bigger, readable and color-coded plates that witnesses can easily see or the CCTV can capture, giving police a lead,” Gordon said.
Gordon cited records of the Philippine National Police (PNP) showing that of the total 28,409 motorcycle-riding crimes or incidents reported from 2010 to 2017, 13,062 or 46 percent were shooting incidents. “And out of over 4,000 motorcycle-riding crimes or incidents in 2016, only eight cases [0.18 percent] were solved,” he added.
He also noted that records from the PNP-Highway Patrol Group also indicate there were about 150 motorcycles stolen every week in Metro Manila alone or an average of 21 per day in 2017, adding that in other parts of the country, of the reported 7,517 vehicles stolen, 6,956 were motorcycles.
Butch Fernandez