Don’t count on speedy passage of RH bill, warns Sotto

Majority Floor Leader Senator Vicente Sotto III. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Proponents of the highly divisive reproductive health (RH) bill had better rethink their schedule if they want the measure approved by August.

Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III expressed doubts the chamber would meet their target date to pass the bill, especially since he and Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile were not fully convinced of the validity and morality of the bill.

Sotto and Enrile are the most vocal critics of the RH bill in the Senate.

Sotto maintains the measure’s proponents have not been convincing in their argument that contraceptives are not immoral and that their use is not a component of a global-based program intended to control the population of developing countries.

The Senate ended the period of interpellation or debate on the RH bill just before Congress  adjourned last week.

Pro-RH bill advocates welcomed this development, noting that it was a signal that the issues surrounding the bill had been settled.

Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago, cosponsor of the RH bill, expressed confidence the measure would be approved by August, with the conciliatory mood now prevailing in the Senate in the aftermath of the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona.

Santiago said the senators had had their fill of arguments after the contentious trial.

Senator Pia Cayetano, the bill’s main sponsor,  noted that Enrile had begged off from asking more questions, which led to the closing of the period of interpellation after Senator Aquilino Pimentel III, the last to seek clarifications on the measure, finished his interrogation.

Sotto, however, did not agree.

The majority leader, whose main function is to lay down the issues to be tackled in sessions, said he still planned to deliver a “turno en contra” (opposition’s turn) speech against the RH bill in August.

This means that approving the measure then would be “impossible,” he said in a text message.

Under the rules, once the period of interpellation is over, a bill being discussed on the floor is subjected to a period of amendments.

This means all proposed changes in the wordings and the inclusion of new provisions would be presented on the floor and scrutinized.

A “turno en contra” speech would likely delay, if not derail, a measure.

Sotto said it was more likely  the Senate would approve the Freedom of Information (FOI) bill before the RH bill as 22 senators had signed the measure expressing their support for the FOI measure’s speedy approval.