A Pinoy Blog About Nothing

I’m not a lawyer but I’m old enough to know this stinks. Another message from the inbox. This is what happened to Azrael in more detail. (A slightly more “organized” post here.)

> Can you give us a more detailed report of the incident?
>
> At which station did happen?
sa amin sa Legarda station, a friend will deliver my cd full of mp3, files and docu for our event, also contains some orig dvd and cd. eh sa akin dadalhin yun cd..hanggan Santolan station.

> How did they find your CDs?
they are having a mass inspection in the Legarda station, as my friend says…at madami daw sila nakuhaan ng cds. too bad hindi namin nakuhaan ng picture.kasi we are stuck in MRT santolan talking to the police and MRT admin.

> What reason did they give for supposedly confiscating your CDs?
sabi ng police…. its a major operation daw ito…last week pa daw. nung una sabi.mga bold vcd lang yung kinukuha nila…ngayon..kahit ano pirated stuff daw… kaso they also say that..they have problems in identifying a data cd and a pirated cd…..hindi din ata nila alam ang tungkol sa mga data files at mp3

> Did you get the name of the guard?
hindi namin nakuha yung name ng guard…..kasi police yung kumuha…pero naisoli naman agad…after a 1 hour na negotiation with the MRT admin dito sa Santolan station. tapos nasoli din lahat at pinapasok na sa MRT yugn friend ko galing sa Legarda station going to Santolan station. and then we meet at the Santolan station to get the cds.

dame hassle at dame oras na sayang dahil lang dito.

Ladies and gentlemen, your civil liberties are being threatened:

Section 2. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures of whatever nature and for any purpose shall be inviolable, and no search warrant or warrant of arrest shall issue except upon probable cause to be determined personally by the judge after examination under oath or affirmation of the complainant and the witnesses he may produce, and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.

1987 Philippine Constitution

So what’s next? Road blocks to search your car if you’re coming from Quiapo or Makati Cinema Square or Sta. Lucia East? Police searching your house when they hear you’re watching a movie in your home to check if it’s the pirated version? If Senator Kap would have his way, he’ll have cops seizing your computer for “acquiring pornographic materials.” (via Bulletproof Vest) Yes if that bill comes into law, you can spend 12 to 20 years in jail for receiving that fake, naked picture of Britney Spears forwarded to you by your 15-year old walking hormones of a cousin .

That is just lazy law enforcement. These address the symptoms instead of the root cause. Time and again they would raid Quiapo for pirated goods. But mere minutes after the raid, the vendors are back opening their stalls. They can even say what day and time these raids will happen as they receive tips before hand. Ano yan moro-moro? If they were sincere in eradicating piracy then they should’ve closed down these places where they sell pirated CDs and DVDs years ago.

I may not be there but I have friends and family who are directly affected by this. They make an honest living and they happen to carry around their work in CDs and DVDs. That’s the nature of their job. I used to carry around back-ups of contracts, projections, and marketing plans in CDs. Totally square thing to do sure, but is there any other way to carry large amounts of data short of carrying around a hard-drive?

So - to the Pinoy bloggers everywhere - lawyers, law students, teachers, tech entrepeneurs, columnists, lifestyle watchers, pet enthusiasts, Pinoy expatriates (wala tayong babalikan kung magkataon!), emo journal-ists, home makers, media practitioners, medical professionals, college students, high school students, blogger trendists - I think this is an issue worth looking at, right? You’re looking for an issue to mobilize against? Here’s one that deals with basic freedoms - your freedom to move about without worry of your things being seized by the authorities on a whim.

Who authorized this? Which agency is heading this? Have they stopped? Are they expanding their coverage of the searches? Why aren’t there any bulletins in media? Is it because they’re treating this as a (HAHAHA) sting operation? Are these incidents just due to ‘over zealous law enforcers’ the excuse commonly given the past faux pas like a witness being killed in a shoot out? What can an ordinary citizen do against these searches? Can he or she refuse to have their bag searched? Can they demand to see a warrant?

I’d be glad if this turns out to be one big foul-up. But if it isn’t, then it’ll be a long fight.
These kinds of searches happened in the past once.
Back in 1970s.
It was called Martial Law.