News
ABA ROLI Pioneers Effort to Curb Extrajudicial Killings in the Philippines
The United States Department of State’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor has selected ABA ROLI to spearhead a new program to combat the occurrences of political assassinations and kidnapping, commonly known as “extrajudicial killings,” in the Philippines. Read more »»
- Rules on Small Claims Court Projects Finalized in the Philippines
- ABA ROLI Co-sponsors Discussions on Philippine Rule of Civil Procedure
- First Round of Gender Discrimination Seminars Held in Baguio City
- ABA ROLI Completes Final Judge-to-Judge Session in the Philippines
- ABA ROLI and IPB Publishes Annotation of the Code of Professional Responsibility
Programs
Sandiganbayan
ABA-ROLI in cooperation with the USAID-funded ROLE project and The Asia Foundation project has supported the computerization of the Sandiganbayan (i.e. anti-corruption court). The Sandiganbayan now has ten cases slated for continuous trial and at least three of the five divisions are working successfully with the computerized court Case Management Information System (CMIS). Read more »»
Anti-Money Laundering Training
In conjunction with the Asian Development Bank, the Asia Foundation, the Rule of Law Effectiveness Program, and the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Prosecutorial Development Assistance, the ABA has co-sponsored several anti-money laundering trainings on subjects such as best practices on court rules and procedures for money-laundering/civil forfeiture actions. Read more »»
New Code of Judicial Conduct for the Philippine Judiciary (Annotated)
To support and assist the members of the Judiciary in understanding the New Code of Judicial Conduct for the Philippine Judiciary, ABA worked in collaboration with the Philippines Judicial Academy (PhilJA) and the University of the Philippines Institute for Judicial Administration (UP-IJA) to develop an annotation of the new Code. Read more »»
Judicial Reform Index
ABA-ROLI conducted an assessment of the Philippine judicial system using its Judicial Reform Index, a tool developed by the ABA to assess judicial reform and judicial independence in emerging democracies and transitioning states. Read more »»
Continuing Legal Education
In order to improve regulation, oversight, and compliance of the Supreme Court's Mandatory Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) program, ABA-ROLI assisted the MCLE Office in a survey to assess the effectiveness of the MCLE training program and to identify areas for improvement. Read more »»
Judicial Education
To facilitate the sharing of common concerns and the exchange of ideas on how to meet professional challenges, ABA-ROLI is sponsoring a series of "judge-to-judge" dialogues in the Philippines. Read more »»
Development of Teaching Module in Legal Ethics
ABA-ROLI partnered with the University of the Philippines Law School to develop a module for a specialized ethics course. The process involved initial training on the use of interactive teaching techniques, the development and pilot testing of the ethics course during the second semester of 2005-2006 school year, and finally the compilation of the course reading materials. Read more »»
Publications
- Judicial Reform Index (JRI) for the Philippines (March 2006)
- Analysis of the Rules of Evidence and the Electronic Rules of Evidence for the Republic of the Philippines (April 9, 2006)
- Analysis of the 1997 Civil Procedure Rules (Rules 1-71 of the Rules of Court) for the Republic of the Philippines (January 10, 2007)
- Code of Conduct for Court Personnel Poster (January 2007)
- Brochure on Code of Conduct for Court Personnel (January 2007)
- Teaching Manual on Legal Ethics (February 2007)
- New Code of Judicial Conduct for the Philippine Judiciary – Annotated (February 2007)
Scott Ciment, Country Director
For more information about the ABA in the Philippines, contact:
abaasia@staff.abanet.org
Background
The Philippines is an island nation located in Southeast Asia bounded on the east by the Philippine Sea, the China Sea on the north and west and the Celebes Sea on the south. The country is a cluster of 7,107 islands with a total land area of approximately 300,000 square kilometers.
ABA-ROLI has been implementing a comprehensive Program in Support of Law Reform in the Philippines through funding from USAID since 2003. In implementing these programs, ABA-ROLI works in close partnership with the Philippine Supreme Court, the Philippine Judicial Academy, the law faculties at the University of the Philippines and the Ateneo de Manila University, the Philippine Women Judges Association (PWJA), some local NGOs, and the two leading bar associations in the country, the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) and Philippine Bar Association. (PBA). ABA-ROLI implements the Philippines program through an American Attorney based in Manila, working in collaboration with two local attorneys. The programs are equally distributed among the three island groups, Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
Meet Our Staff
Renato Lopez (Jun), has been with ABA’s Asia Division since the opening of its Manila office in January 2004. He previously worked as a legal specialist for another USAID-funded program, working on various legal and judicial reform projects. Read more »»
