The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) should be given prosecuting powers to pursue the cases submitted to them, the constitutional agency's chief said on Wednesday.

In an interview with Mornings@ANC, CHR Chairman Chito Gascon said per the constitutional provision, the commission is given only monitoring and reportorial powers.

This means that they would still have to seek prosecution service and Ombudsman for cases to be filed in court.

"In some cases, we are also asked to participate in the prosecution process, assisting the prosecutor of the ombudsman, but for the most part, once we submit the recommendation, it is the prosecution service and the ombudsman that take over," he said.

After they file the recommendation, they would monitor to "ensure perpetrators are ultimately held to account," but Gascon noted that only one in every three of their recommendations proceed to be cases filed in court.

He cited difference--wherein they in the commission look at the case from "from a human rights perspective," with emphasis on the violations--while the prosecution team "normally looks at it from a criminal law perspective so they look at the standards of the revised penal code."

"Often what happens the prosecution service do not pursue our recommendations with respect to human rights violation and proceeds only with respect to criminal law violation," he said.

There is ongoing discussion, he said, about one option of giving the CHR at least limited prosecution powers to pursue human rights violations cases.

"Another option is to empower the prosecution service to have dedicated human rights section, with the prosecutors dealing exclusively with human rights cases and ultimately it might involve either the Supreme Court designating certain courts as human rights courts as they do for family courts or other specific functions, so they create some sort of specialization," he added.

The CHR is currently investigating over 200 cases of drug-related deaths, but Gascon noted that it is only 15% of the total number of cases which has reached 2,000, not including new cases every day.

Gascon said, their office would like to accommodate more, but their small staff and pool of investigators are already stretched due to lack of resources.

"But it is our intention that over time, we should be able to address all these cases," he maintained.

CHR might suffer further with a proposed budget cut, if they are allowed only P471.6 million, which is about 40 percent lower than the P780-million budget request it had submitted.

READ: CHR claims budget dept nearly halved its funding request

"That’s par for the course and this year, President [Rodrigo] Duterte’s budget actually gives us a 7% increase than from last year," said Gascon.

He said, they were surprised and happy about this increase, but maintained that they would need much more to perform their function at a far larger scope.

"We requested more and given the challenges now, we actually need much more resources to be able to do our work if public wants us to do issues beyond just the extrajudicial killings, then we need of course, more resources," he said.

Nevertheless, Gascon assured that they do not think "that the current administration is making life difficult" for the commission, and will continue to work with the administration while maintaining its mandate.

"We're prepared to work with this government, and find out what might be a good balance in terms of pursuing our initiatives and programs, ensuring our independence, but also addressing the human rights concern today," he said.