While FOI slumbers in House,
bill zips through Senate

WHILE THE LONG-DELAYED Freedom of Information bill appears to have stalled in the House of Representatives, the Senate version of the measure is on a roll in the Philippine Senate.

Both the majority and minority blocs in the Senate have already signaled their support for Senate Bill 3208, as contained in Committee Report 156 endorsed by the Senate Committee on Public Information under Senator Gregorio Honasan.

On Tuesday, Minority Floor Leader Alan Peter Cayetano and Senator Loren Legarda delivered co-sponsorship speeches in support of the FOI bill.

Cayetano said the FOI would be the best Christmas gift that the Senate could give to the Filipino people, as it simply returns to the people the power that they have given to the government.

In fact, Cayetano said the FOI turns “every Filipino into a graftbuster,” by giving him the power to ask for information and demand accountability from his government.

“Ang FOI ay nagtatanggal ng kapangyarihan sa kamay ng iilan at ibinibigay ito sa lahat,” Cayetano said in his co-sponsorship speech.
“Oras na isauli natin ang hiniram nating kapangyarihan sa ating mga mamamayan. Ipasa natin ang FOI.”

For her part, Legarda said the string of scandals that the Senate has investigated over the years was a clear indication of the need for an FOI.

Cayetano told members of the Right to Know Right Now Coalition, an alliance of some 150 media, civil society, and lawyers groups backing the FOI, that almost all the members of the Senate have already committed to support the bill.

In fact, Cayetano said FOI proponents in the Senate could have rushed the measure through the plenary if not for concerns that this would create the impression that the Senate railroaded the measure.

Cayetano said the chamber will wrap up the FOI deliberations in the Senate floor in the next few days, with a guarantee that the measure will be passed by the Senate before the Christmas break.

Majority Floor Leader VIcente Sotto said the Senate leadership had decided to defer consideration of the bill, as some Senators want some more time to study the proposal.

Cayetano’s statements stand in stark contrast to the slow progress of the measure in the House of Representatives. If the Senators had to put the brakes on the FOI in the Senate, the bill’s proponents are complaining that the House leadership has consistently demonstrated a lack of support for the FOI.

The House version of the FOI was finally approved by the House Committee on Public Information, but committee chairman Ben Evardone was quoted as saying he wants to call another committee hearing just so committee members could sign the committee report.