Davao City mayor and presidential candidate Mayor Rodrigo Duterte came under fire anew when AMNESTY International raised red flags about the human rights record of the Davao City mayor and expressed alarms at the public’s fascination with his notoriety for using trigger-happy solutions to one of the country’s main problems, higher crime rate.
AMNESTY International is best known worldwide for human rights advocacy, the nongovernment organization, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1977. According to the NGO, they had been monitoring “for the longest time,” the activities of Mayor Duterte.
The Mayor of Davao City emerged as the front-runner in various opinion polls conducted by reliable survey companies. The NGO that is closely monitoring the Davao City mayor for his alleged links to the vigilante group “Davao Death Squad,” also noted that the latest pronouncement of the mayor distressed the NGO.
Mayor Duterte pronounced earlier that if he is given the chance to hold the highest office in the country, he intended to revive the death penalty and “to execute it on a weekly basis,” as stated by Amnesty International Philippines (AIP) chair Ritz Lee Santos III.
Although there are no formal charges in court against Mayor Duterte, the NGO cited records of the Commission on Human Rights, which monitor the NGO also monitors, that there are allegations of human rights violations against Mayor Duterte.
