BAGUIO CITY – A Baguio City Human Rights Action Team (BCHRAcT) will soon be formed here as part of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR)’s Human Rights Action Center and Rule of Law (HRAC and RoL) strategy to mainstream human rights principles at the grassroots level.
The CHR-CAR headed by officer-in-charge regional director Romel Daguimol on Thursday facilitated the organizational meeting of the BCHRAcT members led by city administrator Carlos Canilao.
The HRAC and RoL “widens the democratic space” for civil society, non-government and people’s organizations to be part of local governance particularly on addressing issues and concerns on human rights, rule of law and access to justice, according to Daguimol.
BCHRAcT’s formation is based on the Dept. of Interior and Local Government-CHR Joint Memorandum Circular No. 1 series of 2014 entitled Mainstreaming Human Rights through Rule of Law and Access to Justice at the Level of Provinces, Cities, Municipalities and Barangays.
It will be composed of the city administrator as chair, city legal officer as co-chair with the city social welfare and development officer, city planning and development coordinator, city health officer, city information officer, Philippine National Police human rights affairs officer, city schools division superintendent, barangay human rights action officer and representatives from civil society, non-government and people’s organizations advocating human rights.
The BCHRAcT will operate the HRAC, a unit at the city government that will act on human rights matters including human rights promotion and complaints on human rights violations to ensure the city government of its mandate to respect, protect and fulfill human rights within its jurisdiction.
The team will be specifically tasked to develop and implement the human rights plan of the local government unit, propose to the city council the integration of human rights programs, projects and activities in the budget, recommend appropriate legislations to the human rights committee of the council, utilize available resources for human rights promotion activities, spearhead and coordinate the implementation of human rights programs, projects and activities, among others.
During the meeting, the members prepared an administrative order which will be presented to Mayor Mauricio Domogan for approval and pave the way for the formal creation of the team. – A Refuerzo
