Short answer. Yes, within limits. The anti-VAWC law allows ascendants, descendants, and collateral relatives within the fourth civil degree of consanguinity or affinity to file a petition for a protection order on the victim's behalf. So parents, grandparents, children, siblings, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, and first cousins may file.
What the law says
ascendants, descendants or collateral relatives within the fourth civil degree of consanguinity or affinity
RA 9262, Section 9 — Who May File. Read the full provision →
The relatives the law lets file
Among those the Act allows to petition are "ascendants, descendants or collateral relatives within the fourth civil degree of consanguinity or affinity." In plain terms, this covers your direct line — parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren — and the relatives off to the side, up to a fixed limit. The reason a family member is given standing is practical: a person being abused is often isolated and afraid to act, and a relative who sees what is happening should be able to seek protection for her rather than stand by waiting for her to find the courage to file alone.
How close is "the fourth civil degree"
Degrees are counted by steps between relatives. In the direct line, a parent or child is the first degree and a grandparent or grandchild the second. On the collateral side, siblings are the second degree, an aunt, uncle, niece, or nephew the third, and first cousins the fourth — the outer edge the law allows. Consanguinity means blood relatives; affinity means relatives by marriage, counted the same way, so an in-law within that range also qualifies. A relative more distant than a first cousin falls outside this particular door.
Falling outside the degree is not the end
If the person willing to help is not a relative within the fourth degree, they are not necessarily powerless. The Act opens the same right to a wide group beyond family — social workers of the DSWD or the local government, police officers, the Punong Barangay or a kagawad, your lawyer or health provider, and even two concerned responsible citizens with personal knowledge of the abuse. So the fourth-degree limit governs who may file as a relative; it does not shut out a friend or professional who fits one of the other categories the law lists.
What still has to be shown
A relative's standing to file does not lower the bar on the merits. The petition must still set out abuse of the kind the Act covers and the relationship that brings it within the law. The relative brings the case and can seek a barangay order, a temporary protection order from the court, or a permanent one after a hearing; the court weighs the evidence and decides. Because venue and speed matter when someone is in danger, a relative who files should act promptly and gather what proof exists. This is general information, not advice on a particular case.