Zamboanga City is opposed to a plea bargain for Moro National Liberation Front founding chairman Nur Misuari, who faces charges over the 2013 siege of the city, but will respect the president's decision to meet with the fugitive rebel leader.
Mayor Ma. Isabelle Climaco-Salazar said the city will abide by the prerogative of the president meet with Misuari.
Salazar said she has already personally told the president that Misuari and his alleged involvement in the siege is a sensitive subject for Zamboanga City residents.
“At the end of the day, it is still the executive prerogative to lift that warrant of arrest, but, definitely, the sensitivity, we told the president (about it)... the president can weigh on this,” Salazar said
Duterte in his visit to Lamitan City, Basilan last week he is set to meet Misuari either in Basilan or in this city this week.
City legal officer Jesus Carbon, a former judge, said that aside from the rebellion charges, Misuari is also facing charges at the Sandiganbayan anti-graft court over the alleged malversation of funds when he was still governor of the Autonomous Region in Mindanao.
'We have to follow rule of law'
“You have to respect the actions of the president in trying to find peace in Mindanao. But we have also to follow the rule of law,” Carbon told reporters at a press briefing at city hall on Monday.
“I don’t know if the president has taken this into account. While we have to respect the actions of the president, we have to follow the rule of law,” Carbon stressed.
The city legal officer also said the planned meeting between President Duterte and Misuari will not affect the city's decision to pursue the charges of rebellion and for violations of international humanitarian law filed in Pasig court against Misuari and more than 200 others involved in the 2013 Zamboanga siege.
Carbon said he told the court that the city government is determined to pursue the charges. He said the city also objected to any form of plea bargaining or any agreement that would lower the penalties against the accused.
“This might mean, if you are given the go signal by the mayor and by the city council... If the judge rules against our opposition to plea bargaining agreement we might go to the higher court, with due respect to the judge who is trying to speed up the trial of these cases,” he said.
Carbon said that the last pre-trial hearng on the pre-trial agreement and plea bargaining agreement will be on Oct. 25. He said that under the proposed plea bargain, the accused face imprisonment of less than 2 years, with some in the three batches of accused facing just a year and two months in prison.
More than 200 of the accused have been detained for more than three years since being arrested inside the city during the fighting.
Carbon said they also objected to a proposal of the court to try the cases in batches. Some of the accused have said they were mere boat operators and others said they were only participating in a peaceful demonstration.
He said the cases that the city filed allege conspiracy. “Meaning, they were all together. The act of one is the act of all.”
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