Bill on rallies: No permit needed but tougher penalties

Rallies, like this one in Cebu City, will have fewer obstacles but stiffer penalties. —JUNJIE MENDOZA/ CEBU DAILY NEWS

The House of Representatives on Monday passed a bill scrapping the Marcos-era requirement for organizers to first secure a mayor’s permit before any public assembly.

Under the New Public Assembly Act, organizers only need to serve a notice of the event to the mayor three working days before the public assembly.

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Should the mayor or his representative refuse to accept the notice, the organizer could post it on the city official’s office and it would be deemed to have been duly served.

Such notice, however, would not be required for assemblies held in a freedom park, a private property with the owner’s consent and on the campus of a state-run educational institution.

But the mayor could still prevent the event should there be “clear and convincing evidence based on personal knowledge” that the assembly would cause danger to public order, safety, morals or health.

Regressive

While the new law replaces the “mayor’s permit” required by Batas Pambansa Bilang 880 (BP 880), opposition lawmakers assailed it for the continued imposition of a notice requirement, as well as its stiffer penalties for violators.

The law “contains regressive provisions inimical to the right of free expression, of peaceful assembly and the right to redress of grievances,” said Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman.

Anakpawis Rep. Ariel Casilao said the penalties “heavier than the current ones … would eventually restrict the freedoms of our people in their right to redress the government.”

Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Arlene Brosas said the imposition of a notice requirement would still be “a direct attack on human rights.”

Under the new law, holding a public assembly at a “time and place other than that approved” by the mayor would carry a penalty of from six months to six years’ imprisonment, a stiffer sanction than the current one to six months’ imprisonment imposed by BP 880.

A mayor’s arbitrary and unjustified filing of a legal action or refusal to accept the notice, as well as a law enforcer’s discharge of a firearm during dispersal, would also be penalized with imprisonment of from six months to six years.