The Supreme Court (SC) has ruled that members of indigenous cultural communities cannot invoke their own customary laws and practices to evade prosecution for criminal offenses filed before regular courts of law.
In a decision written by Associate Justice Marvic Mario Victor F. Leonen, the SC said that Republic Act No. 8371, the 1997 Indigenous People’s Rights Act , does not strip the courts of jurisdiction over criminal cases filed against indigenous people.
It pointed out that the provision in the law under Section 15 explicitly states that this right is applicable only “within their respective communities” and only for as long as it is “compatible with the national legal system and with internationally recognized human rights.” With the ruling, the SC denied the petition filed by Roderick Sumatra, known as Ha Datu Tawahig as tribal chieftain of Higaonon Tribe, who wanted the Cebu Regional Trial Court to honor the 2007 dismissal of his rape case by the Dadantulan Tribal court.
In denying the petition, the SC said that with the passage of the 1987 Constitution, the IPRA was adopted in recognition that indigenous peoples have been “resistant to political, social, and cultural inroads of colonization, non-indigenous religions and cultures, and became historically differentiated from the majority of Filipinos.”
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