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Philippine Justice Sector Stakeholders' Meeting

Welcome Messages by
C. Lawrence Greenwood, Jr.
Vice President, Operations 2
Asian Development Bank

21 July 2008
ADB Headquarters, Mandaluyong City

Chief Justice Puno, Secretary Gonzales, Undersecretary Panadero, Assistant Ombudsman Baliton, Assistant Ombudsman Jalandoni, Assistant Solicitor General Miranda, and officials of the Philippine Government: may I, on behalf of the Asian Development Bank, welcome you to our Headquarters and congratulate you for leading the ongoing judicial or justice reform initiatives in your respective agencies. I also welcome your Excellencies from the Diplomatic Corps, the development partners here present, the representatives from the private sector, academe, and civil society for your participation in this afternoon's meeting and for your support to justice sector reforms in the Philippines.

Chief Justice Puno, I would like to congratulate you for the very recent successful holding of a Forum on Increasing Access to Justice for the Poor and Vulnerable Groups. As we know, this forum was actively supported by Development Partners, in particular, the EU, The Asia Foundation, and the USAID. And we likewise support the forum's laudable objectives, such as: 1) to identify the issues and concerns of the marginalized sectors regarding the court system; and 2) to provide inputs as to how the Court under its constitutional rule-making power can enhance existing rules or promulgate new ones to increase their access to justice through the courts, thus upholding the people's socio-economic rights.

Not only was the recent Forum laudable in its objectives, the format was revolutionary too. From what I gathered, the 2-day Forum was linked via video-conferencing across the country (Manila, Cebu, and Cagayan de Oro), enabling a wide scope of representation across the nation, with representatives from farmers, fisherfolks, indigenous peoples, women, migrant workers, urban poor, muslim communities, labor groups, among others, being able to articulate their views and participate actively.

I have also read (in the Philippine Daily Inquirer) the efforts of the Department of Justice, supported by the Department of the Interior and Local Government, to strengthen the Barangay Justice System. Chief State Prosecutor Jovencito Zuno was quoted in the newspaper to have said that the mediation system, through the Barangay (i.e., Village districts) prevented indiscriminate filing of cases in courts and resulted in government savings of more than P24 billion. Another related initiative to de-clog the courts is the Justice-on-Wheels, also known as Mobile Courts program, of the Judiciary. This program is effectively supported by the World Bank.

Moreover, let me congratulate the Government in its establishment of the Judiciary, Executive and Legislative Advisory and Consultative Council (JELACC). Through a Memorandum of Agreement signed on 13 May of this year by the President, the Chief Justice, the Senate President and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, you are institutionally addressing the budgetary issues that have hamstrung the Judiciary and the other justice sector agencies. I understand that this is a new beginning in inter-government dialogue in areas of major concern. This initiative has inspired us, development partners, to support efforts in Justice sector reforms.

But as we know, despite recent successes and achievements, important challenges remain. The Philippine justice system is often cited as a contributing factor in the low comparative rankings of the Philippines on a number of widely known indices of economic competitiveness. Governance indicators by the World Bank cited the Philippines falling behind Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam in the Rule of Law. Moreover, the American Bar Association's Judicial Reform Index expressed concern over "inefficiency, frequently resulting in a filing to completion period of five or more years in civil and criminal cases". These assessments reflect the underlying problems and difficulties in the justice sector. Thus, human and financial resources and physical infrastructure remain inadequate or poorly allocated and managed; workloads throughout the sector are unrealistically high; court dockets remain highly congested and delays are excessive; jail populations are growing, largely with prisoners awaiting trial, while conviction rates remain very low. These challenges need to be faced squarely.

ADB will support Government's efforts in meeting them. ADB's partnership in the justice sector started with the Philippine Judiciary led by the Supreme Court, in support of the Action Program for Judicial Reform (APJR) in 2001. Since then, the ADB has provided technical assistance to support the following areas: 1) strengthen judicial independence and accountability; 2) improve financial management and results based management practices in Judicial administration; and 3) reengineering of the judiciary's administrative structure to achieve suitable skills-mix and organizational and functional configurations for the courts, including support for a pilot regional court administration office (RCAO), paving the way for the decentralization of court administration.

Presently, the ADB is processing a Governance and Justice Reform Program. This Program aims to strengthen the capacity of justice sector agencies, including the judiciary, in their all important task of delivering justice to the people of the Philippines in a manner that is both efficient and equitable. This is a large task and will require sustained effort from all parties including the Development Partners gathered here today.

Distinguished participants, while ADB is committed to continue its support for Justice sector reforms, we would like to bring our common aspiration and support for the Justice Sector agencies to a new level. In this spirit we are pleased to host this event in the hope that it will enable participants to better understand each others approaches and objectives. Through this event and an ongoing process that may emerge from it I hope that we will be able to, amongst other things:

• Confirm Philippine Justice Sector Stakeholders' commitment to coordinated reforms in the justice sector;
• Facilitate discussions leading to the initiation of a government-led coordination mechanism for dialogue between justice sector agencies and Development Partners;
• Reach a better understanding on issues of common concern, including financial and physical resource allocations in the justice sector agencies and their corresponding accountabilities;
• Facilitate sharing of ideas, experiences, best practices and reform initiatives that address justice sector reforms in general, as well as reforms that aim to improve coordination within the justice sector.

We look forward to a fruitful discussion this afternoon, to enhance the partnership of the development community and the Government of the Philippines in achieving the common objectives of good governance in the justice sector.