Second, and arising necessarily from the previous, the situation of women and children directly affected by the War on Drugs, asks the question: what is the State doing about it? Here then, the stories of women point to the invisibility of gender-specific issues in the context of the War. It is ironic that gender-based violence and violence against children have been touted as one of the justifications for the War on Drug, yet the very population directly affected by this were not even consulted on this national campaign, much less has given thought to the intensification of human rights violations against women and children in its wake. As the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) reminds its States Parties, it is not only the explicit intent of State measures that matters in defining human rights violations, but also its results.22 It is also important to emphasize that the government and its agencies are mandated under the Philippine Constitution to exercise due diligence to ensure that the human rights of all its citizens is upheld, as matter of State policy, and translated in all its interventions. State Policies, Section 11. The State values the dignity of every human person and guarantees full respect for human rights. Article XIII, Section 1. The Congress shall give highest priority to the enactment of measures that protect and enhance the right of all the people to human dignity, reduce social, economic, and political inequalities, and remove cultural inequities by equitably diffusing wealth and political power for the common good. The Philippine government thus neglects its duty when it refuses to recognize the human rights violations embedded in the design of its anti-drug campaign, whether in its implementation or its aftermath. It also contradicts the Constitution when the State, as represented by the President, itself rejects the principles of human rights when it makes human rights conditional to whether one is tagged as a criminal or not and without due process, or when it does little to abate the culture of violence and impunity supporting the EJK. To date, the gap in the State response to the continuing human rights violations against women and children is filled in by non-State actors, specifically, civil society organizations and private actors. The former includes the churches, non-profit organizations and the academe. 22 The Philippines is a State Party to the CEDAW when it ratified the international convention in 1981. Article 1 of CEDAW defines discrimination against women as “…any distinction, exclusion or restriction made on the basis of sex which has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, on a basis of equality of men and women, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field.” [italics supplied] Panaghoy: The Philippine War on Drugs from the Perspective of Women March 2019 60