THE Prosecutors’ League of the Philippines (PLP) asked the Supreme Court to defer the implementation of a new rule, requiring the submission  of “judicial affidavits” instead of the direct testimony of witnesses.

In a seven-page letter signed by PLP President Jaime Umpa, the group sought a deferment of the High Tribunal’s Administrative Matter No. 12-8-8-Supreme Court or the Judicial Affidavit Rule.

Under the new rule, when a party (whether plaintiff or defendant) questions his own witness, he no longer needs to place the witness on the witness stand. The party or his lawyer merely submits the written sworn statement or the judicial affidavit of his witness in a question-and-answer format.

The rule, which was approved unanimously in September, also requires each party to the case to attach all his documentary evidence to the judicial affidavit, which in turn, must be submitted at least five days before the pre-trial or preliminary conference of the case.

The new rule was seen to reduce time for presenting the testimonies of witnesses by about two-thirds, following a pilot test in Quezon City courts.

However, the group said that “prosecutors in the regional, provincial and city prosecution offices have limited time to prepare judicial affidavits because they are already saddled with heavy workloads, such as trial, including criminal and special proceedings cases; preliminary investigation, inquest proceedings and summary investigation.”

The group said that “the Quezon City experiment cannot apply to prosecution offices with lesser number of prosecutors.”

“While litigants in Quezon City usually reside within the city, those in regions and provinces reside in inaccessible and far flung areas. Thus, they will spend additional expenses in going to prosecution offices to execute their judicial affidavits,” the PLP said in its letter.

“The preparation of the judicial affidavit takes more time than conducting direct examination in court because affiants have to be subpoenaed and interviewed before the prosecutor could prepare their judicial affidavit,” it added.

The prosecutors’ league also said that the preparation of a single affidavit could not be completed in two hours, more so if the witness is a child.

“Hence, it will be difficult to submit the judicial affidavits before the court not later than five days before the pre-trial or preliminary conference or before the hearing.

The PLP urged the court to defer the implementation of the new rule for at least a year.