BAD PRECEDENT

Senators Tito Sotto and Chiz Escudero have been recently in the news, urging the President to certify as "urgent" the passage of the still controversial Freedom of Information Bill, which seems to be lagging behind in the Lower House even as the Upper House appears raring for its passage before Congress goes on recess in anticipation of the forthcoming elections.  That, after the passage of the even far more controversial RH Bill, thanks or no thanks to the presidential certification of its urgency during the dying days of last year.  Of course, whether or not the President would give in to the two Senators' request remains to be seen. 

But based at least on how the House has railroaded the passage of the RH Bill on the strength of the clear presidential intrusion into an otherwise purely legislative process, methinks, with due respect and with malice towards none, the President had abused, and might again be tempted to abuse,  his constitutional mandate in this regard.  I do not recall any past president had acted as arbitrarily before.     

And that is because Section 26(2), Article VI of the Constitution clearly provides that "no bill passed by either House shall become a law unless it has passed three readings on separate days, and printed copies thereof in its final form have been distributed to each members three days before its passage, except when the President certifies to the necessity of its immediate enactment to meet a public calamity or emergency.  There can be no gainsaying the fact that the passage of the RH Bill satisfactorily complied with the  "three readings" and "printing and distribution of copies" requirement.  But, for heaven's sake,  where lies the "necessity of its immediate passage to meet a public calamity or emergency?  Everybody knows that that  legislation had undergone very rough sailing in Congress for at least two decades and, up until its final passage, it had been so monumentally  controversial as to divide public opinion practically in the middle.  And so, what kind of calamity or emergency would the nation pass through if the bill had been left for further and deeper national deliberation and discernment?  Of course, what has been done may never be undone, so the saying goes.

Meanwhile, the present administration is known to be lukewarm or indifferent to the passage of the FOI or Freedom of Information Bill  without the ROR "right of reply" proviso inserted, which nonetheless Congress apparently contradicts..  Under this situation. I cannot help but think:  Aren't Sotto and Escudero, who were both against the RH Bill, perhaps just trying to give the President a bitter dose of his own medicine?  I mean, the Senators might be speaking silently in their minds: "Mr. President, you have certified as urgent the passage of the RH Bill even though there is no known calamity or emergency situation threatening the nation even if it were temporarily shelved for further deliberation.  Well, there may not also exist any public calamity or national emergency if the FOI bill, also long debated in previous Congresses, were not immediately passed.   But then, Mr. President,  you should be obliged  follow your own precedent!"  .  

At any rate, these thoughts are mere products of my oftentimes wild and curious imaginations.   Let us then simply  wait and see.