Keep pressure on House to pass FOI bill, 2 senators urge

MANILA, Philippines – Senators pushing for the passage of the Freedom of Information (FOI)  bill on Wednesday called  for an increased public  pressure to compel  the  House of Representatives to immediately act  on it.

Senator Grace Poe. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Despite  President  Benigno Aquino III’s reported  refusal to  certify  the bill  as urgent, Senators  Grace Poe and  Miriam Defensor-Santiago remained hopeful  that the President  would eventually  throw his support behind the proposed measure.

“I advocate for the FOI, they say it’s my baby, of course. I’d rather that it is certified.  I’d rather that the President would see it as urgent,” said Poe, head of the Senate committee on public information.

“On the other hand, we were able to push this in the Senate, without the certification, and I think there are other ways to compel legislators to act faster…”

While the bill was already passed by the Senate, the House of Representatives has yet to pass its own version of the measure.

Poe though noted that no less than Speaker Feliciano Belmonte has promised to pass the bill  at the House  during  the present 16^th Congress.

“…I think that we should keep the pressure on, we should have again participative democracy just like what the FOI is trying to advocate,” the neophyte senator said.

Another advocate of the FOI bill,  Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago, expressed disappointment over  the  President’s decision, saying it was another  “blow” on  efforts to  have  the bill passed into law.

“Well, that’s a disappointment to me because I worked very hard with Senator Grace Poe and some of my major amendments have been adopted…”  Santiago told reporters.

But she hopes that netizens would exert “sufficient  educated public pressure”  for the passage of the bill.

Santiago surmised the President was reluctant to certify the  immediate passage of the  bill  because  of certain provisions  that might compromise the national interest .

“If the House will pass it, since the Senate has already passed it,   the issue is simply whether the President  will be able to veto it. I don’t think he will…” she said as she expressed hope that the  President would eventually “come around.”