President Rodrigo Roa Duterte stresses at a point as he delivers his speech during the Tricycle Operators and Drivers’ Association (TODA) Summit at the Cuneta Astrodome in Pasay City on January 23, 2019. REY BANIQUET/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO

President Rodrigo Duterte wanted parents held responsible for acts of child delinquents, presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said yesterday.

“Mr. Duterte is open to the idea of holding parents accountable once they are proven to be neglectful of their duties,” Panelo said.

Mr. Duterte, in his address to a summit of tricycle drivers and operators in Pasay City, said parents should be conscious of the accountability of their children for they too can be implicated on the basis of neglectful parenting.

This idea, however, will have to be acted on by Congress through a law, according to the Palace official.

“We are not contemplating. The President is expressing an idea. And it’s on the part of Congress to realize such idea. If they are open to that, then they can do something about it,” he said.

For the spokesman, while crime is personal, Congress can still introduce provisions which render parents liable when their child commits a crime.

“I think there should be some kind of punishment for parents if they are neglectful either deliberately or recklessly,” the President’s chief legal counsel said.

“Supposedly, the parents are the trainor of children, the molder of children to become righteous individuals and good citizens,” he explained.

The official likewise addressed the concerns of those opposing the bill on grounds of child incarceration, saying this is not the case in the proposed bill.

“I think the opposition is based on the incarceration of children. Under the proposed bill, there is none… It’s rehabilitation,” he explained.

The Palace spokesman also agreed children should not be placed behind bars alongside convicts. “You cannot be putting in jail these minors. You have to correct them, rehabilitate them, because they become more hardened if they are jailed,” he added.

Mr. Duterte said he is “comfortable” with lowering the age of criminal liability to 12 years old.

“If it’s the final decision, I’m comfortable with it,” he told reporters in a chance interview after the Tricycle Operators and Drivers’ Association Summit in Pasay City.

Asked if he would have agreed with the House’s original proposal of nine years as the minimum age of criminal liability, Duterte said he just insisted on 12 years since congressmen could not agree.

“Yes, the original was really not below nine, above nine, below 12, and then above 12 below 16. That’s the original. I was just returning it,” he said.

“I said just return it to the original if you cannot agree. Return to the original law. But if you have some other ideas in mind, I’m open to it,” he added.

Duterte said the original law set the age of criminal liability to nine years before it was replaced with the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act of 2006 (Republic Act 9344), which exempts children 15 years and below from criminal liability.

“That was the original law before it was changed by the one single Filipino lawmaker who did the greatest disservice to his country,” Duterte said, referring to Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan who authored the law.

He earlier had called Pangilinan’s law a “stupid law” for giving rise to Filipinos with “criminal minds.”

The President, meanwhile, emphasized that as early as nine years, parents should also be conscious of their children’s criminal accountability.

“As early as that age, they should already be reminded because they will be ultimately responsible,” he said.

“Any violation of law committed by children that shows that parents lack supervision and vigilance ng parents, they will face charges,” he added.

Duterte also stressed that minors will not suffer imprisonment but will instead be given lectures by social workers.

“They won’t really be imprisoned. They will only go to social workers to listen to lectures,” he said.