Manila may soon become the world’s execution capital if judges continue handing out death sentences at the present rate, a pro-life lawyers group has warned.

The Free Legal Assistance Group claimed that 5,926 convicts could suffer Leo Echegaray’s fate by the year 2002. Echegaray, 38, was given death sentence for repeatedly raping his 12-year-old step-daughter. On 19 January 1999, the Supreme Court of the Philippines voted 11 to two with two abstentions to lift the six-month stay of the execution it granted earlier. The date and time of Echegaray’s death by lethal injection would be set by a lower court. Echegaray would be the first convict to be put to death in the Philippines in 23 years.

The Estrada presidency could go down in history as the most bloodthirsty administration, pro-life advocates said.

Human rights lawyer and former senator Rene Saguisag said the death penalty "turns a nation into killers." He added that the execution of Echegaray would jeopardise the chances of clemency of more than 100 Filipinos facing execution overseas.

Roan Libarios, one of the few congressmen opposed to capital punishment, denounced the government’s "double standards" by appealing for the commutation of sentences of Filipinos on death row abroad while "insisting on the death penalty here."

Although the Catholic Church in the Philippines and a group of human rights advocates have led opposition to the death penalty, public sentiment appears to favour capital punishment.

Since 31 December 1993 when capital punishment was restored, an average of 12 people a month had been sentenced to death, Amnesty International calculated.

Thirty to 45 days after Echegaray’s execution, the next in line, Pablito Andan, is expected to follow, Congressman Roilo Golez said. Andan’s conviction for rape and homicide was declared final and executory by the Supreme Court on 31 March 1997.

Eight others would have a year-long wait since their convictions were affirmed only last year, Mr. Golez said. The tempo will pick up after that since all in all, there are 698 convicted rapists, murderers and drug traffickers, 10 with affirmed sentences including Echegaray.

Dante Piandong, the fourth in line after Echegaray, urged that the 12 foreigners, all with death sentences still awaiting final affirmation by the Supreme Court, should go first. He complained that the executioners seemed to only want to kill Filipinos.

Eleven of the 12 foreigners - ethnic Chinese, Taiwanese and Japanese - were convicted of drug trafficking. Police officials and anti-crime groups recently claimed that drug money was behind the vigorous lobby to abolish the death penalty.

Meanwhile, police officer Ferdinand Fallorina, who shot and killed a boy flying a kite on a rooftop last year because he was noisy, was sentenced to die by trial court Judge Diosdado Peralta on 19 January 1999.

(Source: This article was compiled from reports in the South China Morning Post on 20 January 1999.)