Republic of the Philippines
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Quezon City

SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
First Regular Session

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House Bill No. 2670

Introduced by Representatives
DIOSDADO MACAPAGAL ARROYO and GLORIA MACAPAGAL ARROYO

AN ACT
ESTABLISHING A DEPARTMENT OF PEACE IN THE PHILIPPINES

EXPLANATORY NOTE

‘As an archipelagic country located in Southeast Asia, the Philippines with its
7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean, sharing maritime borders with Indonesia,
Malaysia, Palau, the Republic of China (Taiwan), and Vietnam, is considered a tropical
paradise due to its vast mountain ranges and forests, the smallest living mammal alive
in the Tarsier, the Philippine Eagle, the perfectly shaped cone of Mayon Volcano in
Bicol, the Chocolate Hills of Bohol, the Tubbataha Reef in Palawan, home to the world's
best beaches, and some of the finest delicacies the world can ever taste. We have also
been considered as one of the most hospitable and warmest people in the world making
us world renowned especially with regard to the tourism industry.

But despite all these, it is such a shame that the Philippines’ potential as a
tourism haven is being stunted by continued deep conflict with enemies of the State like
the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Moro National Liberation Front, the Abu Sayyaf and
the National People's Army. Moreover, we Filipinos continue to be embroiled in deep
conflict with fellow Filipinos. This type of conflict is considered unacceptable because it
prevents us from achieving our goal of promoting the Philippines as a safe and secure
place for both local and international tourists.

We should therefore come up with a lasting solution to our age-old problem of
deep conflict and ensure the success of the country's peace process. We have come


up with this humble proposal which seeks to create a government agency that will aim
to create and foster lasting peace.

Given the importance of this bill, its expeditious passage into law is earnestly
sought.

i) A
/
DIOSDADO M. “AK ARROYO. oven wil PAGAL ARROYO
Second Distrit/ Camarines Sur Sec 4 istrict, Pampanga

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Republic of the Philippines
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Quezon City

SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
First Regular Session

House BillNo.__2670

Introduced by Representatives
DIOSDADO MACAPAGAL ARROYO and GLORIA MACAPAGAL ARROYO

ESTABLISHING A DEPARTMENT OF PEACE IN THE PHILIPPINES

Be it enacted by the Senate and the House of Representatives of the Philippines
in Congress assembled:

SECTION 1. Short Title. — This Act shall be known as the "Department of Peace
Act of 2013.”

SECTION 2. Declaration of Policies. — It is hereby declared the policy of the
State:

1. To promote human security, peace-building, peace-making, and the nonviolent
resolution of conflict principles;

2. To develop and support suitable programs to encourage and assist research,
education, training, advocacy, and policy-making centered on the promotion of
human security, peace-building, peace-making, and the nonviolent resolution of
conflict principles;

3. To provide suitable incentives and rewards for those provinces and regions
that espouse peaceful and non-kKilling principles; and

4. To assist and encourage those communities that experience more violence
and killings in order to alleviate and improve their condition.


SECTIO 3. Establishment of a Department of Peace. — There is hereby
established a DEPARTMENT OF PEACE (hereinafter referred to as the "Department'’).

SECTION 4. Mandate of the Department. — The Department shall -

1, Formulate, recommend and implement national advocacies, plans, programs
and guidelines that will promote and uphold a peaceful, nonviolent and non-killing
principles;

2. Initiate, harmonize and coordinate all peace keeping, non-violent and non-
killing initiatives of the government and its respective agencies;

3. Strengthen civilian and non-military means of peacemaking;

4. Promote a proactive, strategic approach in the development of policies and
programs that promote domestic and international conflict prevention, nonviolent
intervention, mediation, peaceful resolution of conflict, and structured mediation
of conflict;

5, Encourage the development of initiatives from local communities, religious
groups, and non-governmental organizations toward peace;

6. Represent and negotiate for government interest on matters pertaining to
peace, understanding, and cooperation in local and international bodies.

SECTION 5. Secretary of Peace. ~ The Department of Peace shall be headed by
a Secretary of Peace (hereinafter in this Act referred to as the "Secretary"), who shall be
appointed by the President of the Philippines and whose appointment shall be subject to
confirmation by the Commission on Appointments.

The Secretary shall have the following responsibilities and powers:

‘A. IN GENERAL - The Secretary shall -

1. Work proactively and interactively with each branch of the National
Government on all policy matters relating to conditions of violence, peace, non-

killing and conflict resolution;

2. Act as the spokesman on matters of violence, peace, non-killing and conflict
resolution;

3, Engage the intellectual and spiritual resources of the Filipino people in the
pursuit of peace, non-killing and conflict resolution;



4. Monitor and analyze causative principles of conflict and make policy
recommendations for developing and maintaining peaceful conduct, and the
prevention of crisis and violence;

5. Promote and develop program(s) involving citizen participation in all the
elements from peace-building, peace-making and peace-keeping;

6. Develop an intercultural competence to manage conflicts among individuals
and groups;

7. Assist in the establishment and funding of community-based violence
prevention programs, including violence prevention and counseling and peer
mediation in schools;

8. Develop strategies and implement programs to address unhealthy
manifestations of violence in Filipino culture as they relate to both humans and
animals.

B. HUMAN SECURITY RESPONSIBILITIES ~ The Secretary shall address and
offer nonviolent conflict resolution strategies to all relevant parties on issues of human
security if such security is threatened by conflict, whether such conflict is geographic,
religious, ethnic, racial, or class-based in its origin, derives from economic concerns
(including trade or misdistribution of wealth), or is initiated through disputes concerning
scarcity of natural resources (such as water and energy resources), food trade,
environmental and gender concerns.

C. EDUCATIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES — The Secretary shall -

1. Cooperate with scholars, educators and civil society organizers in their
development of peace and human rights education which shall include studies of

a. The human rights movement in the Philippines, Asia, and throughout
the world, with special emphasis on how cooperative endeavor and
involvement have contributed to advancements in peace and justice; and

b. Peace agreements and circumstances in which peaceful intervention
has worked to stop conflict.

2. Offer incentives in the form of grants and training to encourage the
development of provincial and city peace curricula and assist schools in applying
for such curricula;

3. Set up, maintain and publish the Philippine Index of Killing and Non-Killing as a
periodic recording, monitoring, and mapping of the incidence of violence and


killings, as well as of nonviolence and non-killing, in various parts of the country
and the entire archipelago;

4. Provide suitable incentives and rewards for those provinces and regions that
excel in developing peaceful and non-killing communities; and assist and
encourage those communities that experience more violence and killings in order
to alleviate and improve their condition;

5. Work with educators to equip students to become skilled in achieving peace
through reflection, and facilitate instruction in the ways of peaceful conflict
prevention and resolution;

6. Maintain a site on the Internet for the purposes of soliciting and receiving ideas
for the development of peace from the wealth of political, social and cultural
diversity in the country and the world;

7. Proactively engage the critical thinking capabilities of grade school, high
school, and university students and teachers through the Internet and other
media;

8. Provide grants for peace studies departments in colleges and universities
throughout the Philippines.

D. DOMESTIC RESPONSIBILITIES — The Secretary shall -

1. Support local community initiatives that can draw neighborhood resources to
avoid and reduce or stop killing, create peace projects that facilitate the
development of conflict prevention and resolution at the local and national levels
and thereby inform and inspire national policy for peace;

2. Develop community-based strategies for celebrating diversity in languages,
cultures, and religions, promoting respect, and combating prejudice and
discrimination;

3. Assist in the establishment and funding of community-based violence
prevention programs, including non-killing, and violence prevention counseling
and peer mediation in schools;

4. Develop policies that address domestic violence, including spousal abuse,
child abuse and maltreatment of the elderly;

5. Develop policies to address violence against animals;
6. Analyze existing policies, employ successful, field-tested programs, and

develop new approaches for dealing with the implements of violence, including
gun-related violence and the overwhelming presence of handguns;


7. Develop new programs that relate to the societal challenges of school
violence, gangs, racial or ethnic violence, violence against gays and lesbians,
and police-community relations disputes;

8. Make policy recommendations to the Secretary of Justice regarding human
rights and labor law;

9. Counsel and advocate on behalf of women victimized by violence;

10. Contribute to public education programs and counseling strategies
concerning hate crimes;

11. Promote respect for racial, religious, and ethnic diversity; and

12, Ensure that the principles of building a culture of peace guide regional official
languages and employment of equity policies.

E. INTERNATIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES — The Secretary shall -

1. Advise the Secretary of National Defense, the Secretary of Foreign Affairs,
and the Secretary of Interior and Local Government on ail matters relating to
domestic peace and to human and national security, including the protection of
human rights and the prevention of, amelioration of, and de-escalation of
unarmed and armed domestic and international conflict;

2. Provide for the training of all government personnel who administer post-
conflict reconstruction and demobilization in war-torn communities;

3. Sponsor country and regional conflict prevention and dispute resolution
initiatives, create special task forces, and draw on local, regional, and national
expertise to develop plans and programs for addressing the root sources of
conflict and violence in troubled areas;

4. Provide for exchanges between the Philippines and other nations of individuals
who endeavor to develop domestic and international peace based initiatives;

5. Administer the training of civilian peace-keepers who participate in
multinational non-violent police forces and support civilian police who participate
in peacekeeping;

6. Facilitate the development of peace summits at which parties to a conflict may
gather under carefully prepared conditions to promote nonviolent communication
and mutually beneficial solutions;


7. Submit to the President recommendations for reductions in weapons of
violence and destruction including stopping their proliferation;

8. Advice the Philippine Permanent Representative to the United Nations on
matters pertaining to violence and peace, and the United Nations Security
Council; and

9. Provide ethical and value-based analyses of issues and problems to the
Department of National Defense and the Department of Interior and Local
Government.

SECTION 6. Composition. - The Department of Peace shall be headed by a
Secretary. The Department proper shall be composed of the Office of the Secretary,
the Office of the Undersecretary, and Bureau Directors who shall function as follows:

1, UNDERSECRETARY OF PEACE - There shall be in the Department an
Undersecretary of Peace, who shall be appointed by the President. The
Undersecretary shall designate the order in which other officials of the Department shall
act for and perform the functions of the Secretary during the absence or disability of the
Secretary.

2. BUREAU DIRECTORS - There shall be in the Department such Bureau
Directors as may be necessary and authorized by law.

SECTION 7. Bureau of Peace Education and Training. - There shall be in the
Department a Bureau of Peace Education and Training (Bureau) who shall carry out
those functions of the Department relating to the creation, encouragement, and impact
of peace education and training at the elementary, secondary, university, and
postgraduate levels, including the development of a Civilian Peace Service (CPS)

The Bureau shall cooperate with the public and private schools in their
development of peace curricula and learning materials concerned with building peace
communication skills, non-violent conflict resolution skills, and other objectives to
increase the knowledge of peace and non-killing conditions and processes.

The Director for Peace Education and Training shall -

1. Provide peace education grants to colleges and universities for the creation
and expansion of peace studies departments; and

2. Create a Community Peace Grant program under which grants shall be
provided to not-for-profit community and non-governmental organizations for the
purposes of developing creative, innovative neighborhood programs for non-
violent conflict resolution and local peace-building initiatives.


SECTION 8. Bureau for Domestic Peace. — There shall be a Bureau for
Domestic Peace. This Bureau, in collaboration with local government leaders, shall be
responsible for promoting and undertaking domestic peace activities, including the
development of policies that increase awareness about intervention and counseling on
domestic violence and conflict, and those functions in the Department affecting research
and analysis relating to creating, initiating and modeling approaches to peaceful
engagement and non-violent conflict resolution.

The Director for Domestic Peace Activities shall -

1, Develop policies and build on existing programs responsive to the prevention
of violence and killing, including the development of community policing
strategies and peaceful settlement skills among local officials and police and
other public safety officers;

2. Develop community-based strategies for promoting and celebrating diversity
and promoting respect for such diversity;

3. Study the impact of violence and war, especially on the physical and mental
condition of children;

4. Implement the UN Resolution 1325 to promote enhanced participation of
women in peace in all aspects of peace activities ranging from peace -making,
peace-building to post-conflict reconstruction;

5. Review and implement UN deliberations on Rapid Response (R2P2) -
Responsibility to Protect;

6. Publish a monthly journal of the activities of the Department and encourage
scholarly participation;

7. Gather information on effective community peace-building activities and
disseminate such information to local governments and non-governmental
organizations in the Philippines and abroad;

8. Conduct research on the effect of violence in the media and make such
reports available to Congress annually; and

9. Sponsor conferences in the Philippines to create awareness of the work of the
Department.

SECTION 9. Bureau for International Peace (BIP). — There shall be a Bureau of
International Peace which shall be headed by a Director. This Bureau shall be
responsible for the country's international peace activities.

The Director for International Peace shall -


1. Provide for the training and deployment of all Civilian Peace Service graduates
and other non-military conflict prevention and peace-making personnel;

2. Sponsor country and regional conflict prevention and dispute resolution
initiatives in countries experiencing social, political, or economic strife;

3. Advocate the creation of a multi-national non-violent peace force;

4. Provide training for the administration of post-conflict reconstruction and
demobilization in war-torn societies;

5, Provide for the exchanges between individuals of the Philippines and other
nations who are endeavoring to develop domestic and international peace-based
initiatives;

6. Carry out those functions affecting arms control programs and arms limitation
agreements;

7. Advise the Secretary of Peace on all inter-agency discussions and all
international negotiations regarding the reduction and elimination of weapons of
mass destruction throughout the world, including the dismantling of such
weapons and the safe and secure storage of materials related thereto;

8. Assist nations, international agencies and non-governmental organizations in
assessing the locations of the build-up of nuclear weapons;

9. Develop non-violent strategies to deter the testing or use of offensive or
defensive nuclear weapons, whether based on land, air, sea, or in outer space;

10. Serve as a depository for copies of all contracts, agreements and treaties that
deal with the reduction and elimination of nuclear weapons or the protection of
outer space from militarization; and

11, Provide technical support and legal assistance for the implementation of such
agreements.

SECTION 10. Bureau of Human Rights and Economic Rights (BHR). — There
shall be a Bureau of Human Rights and Economic Rights. This Bureau shall perform
those functions in the Department supporting the principles of the Universal Declaration
cof Human Rights passed by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December
10, 1948, and subsequent UN Declarations on Human Rights.

The Director for Human Rights and Economic Rights shall -


1. Assist the Secretary of Peace and the Undersecretary of Peace in furthering
the incorporation of principles of human rights, as enunciated in the United
Nations General Assembly Resolution 217A (Ill) of December 10, 1948, into all
agreements between the Philippines and other nations to help reduce the causes
of violence;

2. Gather information on and document human rights abuses, both domestically
and internationally, and recommend to the Secretary non-violent responses to
correct abuses;

3. Make such findings available to other agencies in order to facilitate non-violent
conflict resolution;

4. Provide trained observers to work with non-governmental organizations for
purposes of creating a climate that is conducive to the respect for human rights;

5. Conduct economic analyses of the scarcity of human and natural resources as
a source of conflict and make recommendations to the Secretary of Peace for
nonviolent prevention of such scarcity, non-violent intervention in case of such
scarcity, and the development of programs of assistance for people experiencing
such scarcity, whether due to armed conflict, maldistribution of resources, or
natural causes; and

6. Assist the Secretary of Foreign Affairs and the Secretary of Finance, in
developing strategies regarding the sustainability and the management of the
distribution of funds from international agencies, the conditions regarding the
receipt of such funds, and the impact of those conditions on the peace and
stability of the recipient nations.

SECTION 11. Consultation in drafting treaties and agreements. - The
Department of Peace shall be consulted in the drafting of treaties and peace
agreements.

SECTION 12. Consultation in cases of conflict. — In any case in which a conflict
between the Philippines and any foreign government or entity is imminent or occurring,
the Secretary of National Defense and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs shall consult with
the Secretary of Peace concerning nonviolent means of conflict resolution.

1. In any case in which such a conflict is ongoing or recently concluded, the
Secretary of Peace shall conduct independent studies of diplomatic initiatives
undertaken by the Philippines and other parties to the conflict.

2. In any case in which such a conflict has recently been concluded, the
Secretary of Peace shall assess the effectiveness of those initiatives in ending
the conflict.


3. The Secretary of Peace shall establish a formal process of consultation in a
timely manner with the Secretary of Foreign Affairs and the Secretary of National
Defense prior to the initiation of any armed conflict between the Philippines and
any other nation; and for any matter involving the use of the Department of
National Defense personnel within the Philippines.

SECTION 13. Advisory Council for Peace. - The Secretary of Peace, the
Secretary of Foreign Affairs, the Secretary of National Defense, and the Secretary of
Interior and Local Government shall form an Advisory Council for Peace, chaired by the
Secretary of Peace. The Advisory Council shall report to and advise the President, the
President of the Senate, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and make
recommendations about the affairs and policies of the Department relating to peace,
non-killing, and nonviolent conflict resolution. The Council facilitated by the Secretary of
Peace shall also serve as a national and international sounding board and nexus for
fostering domestic and international peace.

SECTION 14. Responsibilities. - The Chairman of the Advisory Council shall:

1. Provide a forum for representatives of international actors, national, and local
governments to discuss peace issues;

2. Promote better intergovernmental relations; and

3. Submit biennially or more frequently if determined necessary by the Council, a
report to the President, the Senate, the House of Representatives reviewing the
impact of national and international peace activities on provincial and local
governments and communities.

SECTION 15. Repealing Clause. — All laws, presidential decrees, letters of
instruction, executive orders, rules and regulations, or any part thereof inconsistent with
this Act shall be amended or modified accordingly.

SECTION 16. Effectivity Clause. — This Act shall take effect after fifteen (15)

days following its publication in the Official Gazette or in at least two newspapers of
general circulation.

Approved,