Senator Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito on Tuesday, September 20 said he backs the proposal of granting additional funding for the Department of Justice (DOJ) to enable it to hire more prosecution lawyers.
“This is very important. For prosecution attorneys, at present, there are about 556 unfilled positions for the national prosecution service, napakalaki pala,” Ejercito said during the Senate finance sub-committee hearing on the proposed P26.69-budget of the DOJ for next year.
Under the National Expenditure Program (NEP) for 2023, the recommended budget for the DOJ and its attached agencies is P26.69-billion, which is higher than the 2022 budget of P25.24-billion.
Justice Secretary Crispin Remulla defended the DOJ’s proposed budget, which is only 0.51 percent of next year's total national budget of P5.26-trillion. Also present during the DOJ budget hearing were National Bureau of Investigation Director Atty. Medardo De Lemos, Bureau of Immigration Commissioner Atty. Norman Tansingco and Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra.
The DOJ has proposed the deployment of around 150 prosecution attorneys across 319 prosecution offices nationwide “to increase its efficiency in the rendition of its prosecutorial services and further ramp up its disposition rate of cases.”
With this proposal, Remulla said the department would need additional funding amounting to P220-million to cover the salaries and benefits of these prosecution lawyers.
While there are more than 550 unfilled positions in the National Prosecution Service (NPS), Remulla said the DOJ can only hire 150 lawyers at present.
“We are looking at our absorptive capacity on how many we can really hire. If you really look at the figures right now, we really need 800 law prosecutors. But I think we can only hire at least 150,” he said.
Ejercito then commended Remulla for building on the work of his predecessor and initiating crucial reforms, such as improving coordination between the DOJ and the Philippine National Police (PNP) and launching the construction of a new mega detention facility to replace the overcrowded New Bilibid Prison.
“It’s a good opportunity that Sec. Boying is here instituting genuine reforms also started by Secretary Menandro Guevarra,” he said.
“We will be able to fill up, hopefully, the lack of prosecutors, the improvement of coordination with the PNP, (and) lastly, yung pagtutulungan natin yung plano ni Sec. Boying Remulla to have a mega detention facility kapalit na ng Bilibid (to help out Sec. Remulla’s plan to have a mega detention facility in exchange for Bilibid),” he said.
Meanwhile, Sen. Robinhood Padilla urged the DOJ to continue the implementation of Republic Act 10592 or the Good Conduct Time Allowance (GCTA) law.
Padilla lamented many inmates are qualified to be released but are still suffering in jail for many years.
“During the previous budget hearing, our dear Senator Franklin Drilon spoke about the prisoners who should have benefited from the GCTA law. He said there are 54,189 qualified inmates but so far, only 9,323 prisoners were released from jail,” Padilla said during the hearing.
In response, Remulla assured that the DOJ is continuing the implementation of the GCTA law and the examination of all cases is ongoing in a bid to decongest the jails. He also said he already instructed the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) and the Public Attorney’s Office (PAO) to hasten the review.