Speaker Belmonte vows passage of ‘freedom of info’ bill

Speaker Feliciano Belmonte. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—Despite its slow progress, the freedom of information (FOI) bill will be passed in the House of Representatives during his term, Speaker Feliciano Belmonte said on Monday.

“It’s not something that I feel can be passed next week… but definitely I will see to it that it will get passed,” he said of the bill, which is touted as a key factor in promoting transparency and accountability in government.

Belmonte said he had asked Misamis Occidental Rep. Jorge Almonte, chair of the House committee on public information, to study the issue well.

The Right to Know. Right Now! coalition, an advocate of the FOI bill, wants Almonte to set the meetings of the technical working group (TWG) which will tackle the measure.

Committee member and Democratic Independent Workers’ Association party-list Rep. Emmeline Aglipay said the chair has yet to set a date for the TWG to sit down for the bill.

Aglipay said she had approached Almonte to ask him to set a date for the TWG meeting.

“I am disappointed with the way the chair has handled the FOI bill. If he is sincere, he would have set it. But it seems he is not interested in discussing the dates,” the solon said in a press conference in Quezon City on Monday.

No meeting yet

The TWG has a mid-February deadline to consolidate the 20 FOI bills filed. But the group has yet to meet for the first time on the first week of February, according to Almonte.

In an earlier interview, Almonte said he intends to schedule the TWG meeting on the first week of February as he has to devote attention to other pending bills as well.

Almonte said he had actually objected to the TWG deadline, but he was outvoted.

“What I know is there is such a thing as legislative process. We don’t want shortcuts. What’s important is we have crafted a bill acceptable to everybody,” he said.

The sentiments and views of stakeholders have to be heard as well, he said.

Whether or not the TWG deadline would be met would depend on how the discussions would go, Almonte said.

Dormant

Authors of the FOI bill had said they wanted to fast-track the deliberations on the measure, noting how the bill lay dormant at the committee level for a long time in the previous Congress.

Earlier, Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares warned that proponents of the FOI bill must also be vigilant to ensure that the version approved would not be watered down to the point that it would be virtually toothless.

The Right to Know. Right Now! coalition pointed out that the FOI bill must be in the Congress plenary by June, if it will be passed at all.