The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) signed on Friday, January 10, a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) formalizing its commitment to collaborate with different agencies in the Philippine justice sector to develop and implement the National Justice Information System (NJIS).
The NJIS is an ICT platform that aims to address fragmentation in the justice system by developing information management systems and inter-agency exchange mechanisms.
“We intend to connect all NJIS implementing agencies to each other to facilitate seamless, secure and authenticated information exchange, and other tasks that require digital connectivity,” DICT decretary Gregorio B. Honasan II said.
“The very ideal of a real-time information exchange across agencies through the DICTy is groundbreaking, and I believe the first of its kind in our country,” said Supreme Court chief justice Diosdado M. Peralta.
Under the NJIS, data and information on Philippine laws, and cases involving Persons Deprived of Liberty (PDLs), among others, will be digitized and uploaded to a centralized database and shared throughout the relevant offices in the government.
The information and data will be made accessible to prosecutors, public defenders, judges, law enforcement officers, immigration officers, parole and probation officers, and social workers, among others.
“Our aim is not simply the collation of data and their placement online. Our job does not entail simply collecting information on cases and about those involved in them. Our job is to make sure that correct information and data promptly reach those who administer our criminal justice system so that they may make use of this towards the dispensation of justice,” said Department of Justice (DOJ) secretary Menardo I. Guevarra.
NJIS implementing agencies include the DOJ, Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), Philippine National Police (PNP), National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (NBI), Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB), Bureau of Immigration (BI), Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP), Bureau of Corrections (BUCOR), and Parole and Probation Administration (PPA).
A MOA for the Single Carpeta System, a component of the NJIS, aimed to unify jail records, was also signed between the DOJ, DILG, BJMP, BuCor, and the PPA.
