Lagman, RH bill proponents dismiss Garcia funding claim

House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman dismissed as an “old yarn” a claim by Rep. Pablo Garcia of Cebu’s 2nd district that the Reproductive Health (RH) bill is being bankrolled by a P20 million to P50 million lobby from Washington.

Lagman said the move was meant to “bait RH advocates to protracted and repetitive debates in order to further delay the passage of the RH bill.”

He said there were no takers because Garcia’s ploy “was too obvious and crude.”

“This is a dead and fossilized tirade, which anti-RH solons like Cebu Rep. Pablo Garcia try to resurrect every time the RH bill is at the threshold of approval. Allegation is not proof,” Lagman said in a statement yesterday.

In Cebu, Dr. Rene Bullecer of the Pro Life Coalition in Cebu said Garcia’s claim that pro-RH bill lobbyist are receiving funding from US institutions was “very possible.”

“That explains why RH bill proponents never abandon their fight, which is now on its sixth attempt,” he said.

Bullecer cited an article from cbcp.org written last Dec. 2, 2011 that alleged pro-abortion groups were accepting funding from Western nations to promote contraception and population control.

The document cited funders like the Planned Parenthood and its international arm, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), Marie Stopes International, the Packard Foundation, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

But Roxanne Omega of Bisdak Pride Inc. said they haven’t accepted any donations from international funding agencies.

“We don’t have foreign funding and yet we support the RH bill. This is beyond funding. It is the morality and practicality of RH that needs our support,” Omega told Cebu Daily News.

Omega said Garcia made those claims because he has run out of arguments against the bill. “RH in particular and the people’s right for health in general is a fundamental human right,” she said.

Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes said Garcia should prove his allegations.

“We have to verify if that is true. Since day one that this issue came up, we’re against the bill … Before we accuse someone, we have to double check first,” he said.

Dumanjug Mayor Nelson Garcia, the elder Garcia’s son, declined to comment on the issue.

But Garcia, who’s also Cebu chapter president of the League of Municipalities of the Philippines, (LMP) said he is against the bill.

“I am not in favor of the RH Bill per se … spending billions of pesos for contraceptives while there are people who are very hungry,” he told Cebu Daily News.

The Dumanjug municipal council passed a resolution opposing the bill. .

The LMP national chapter hasn’t come up with a united stand on the issue.

Chapter president and Bacoor Mayor Strike Revilla said while he favors the passage of the bill, he respects each mayor’s stand on the legislation.

In a privilege speech last week, Garcia claimed that pro-RH bill advocates have been acting in a conflict of interest after allowing themselves to be manipulated by a foreign power.

Lagman charged Garcia of being “myopic” about a well-oiled lobby opposing RH, that was funded by the “wealthy Catholic hierarchy.”

He called pro-RH advocates “nationalist legislators that would not take a cent from foreign lobbyists.”

He said Garcia has consistently opposed, and often lost, progressive legislation such as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program and the abolition of the death penalty.

Lagman also defended the Philippine Legislators Committee on Population and Development (PLCPD), which Garcia has called the de facto House committee steering the debates on the RH bill.

“For more than two decades, (PLCPD) has been a well-respected NGO both locally and internationally. Its enduring advocacy on population and development antedates the introduction of the RH bill,” said Lagman.

The RH bill is currently under debate in the session hall and House leaders expect it to be up for voting next year. Reporter Candeze R. Mongaya and Correspondent Carmel Loise Matus with an Inquirer report