Category: Freedom of Information

It’s touch-go for FOI in House; Coalition mounts final push

mcmangahas Leave a comment

WHAT’S UP with the Freedom of Information bill?

It’s in a touch-go situation still in the House of Representatives.

Whether it will fly or die in the 15th Congress will be known in the next four weeks, or in the next nine session days of the House from January 21 to February 6, 2013.

Want to help save and push the FOI bill into law? Read on


Final push for the passage of the FOI Bill: Update on Status

By Atty. Nepomuceno Malaluan
Co-Convenor, Right to Know. Right Now! Coalition and
Co-Director, Institute for Freedom of Information

A. Legislative Status of the FOI Bill

• The Senate has already passed the FOI bill on Second Reading (11 Dec 2012) and Third Reading (17 December). Thus it only awaits the passage of the counterpart measure from the House of Representatives, before a bicameral conference can be convened to harmonize any disagreeing provisions between the Senate and House versions.

• At the House of Representatives, a committee report has been submitted to the House plenary for action. The next step will be for the formal sponsorship of the committee report by the Committee Chairman (Rep. Ben Evardone) and co-sponsorship by interested authors. After sponsorship, the measure will undergo a period of interpellation and then a period of amendments, before it is put to a vote on Second Reading. If the bill is favorably voted on Second Reading, it will again be put to a vote on Third (final) Reading, after a minimum 3 days after copy of the bill passed on Second Reading has been distributed to members. A certification by the President to the necessity of its immediate enactment dispenses of the minimum 3 days of copy circulation.

• Only nine session days remain when Congress resumes session on January 21. After this it will adjourn for elections, and resume for only 3 days in June for the closing ceremonies of the term of the 15th Congress.


B. Malacañang Version was Adopted in Full by Senate and House Committee

• In early 2011, the President organized a Study Group on the FOI bill led by Undersecretary Manolo Quezon, with DBM Secretary Florencio Abad also taking an active role in the Study Group’s work. The Study Group intended to address concerns raised by the President and executive agencies, revolving around the adequacy of protection of national security matters and the President’s executive privilege. They also addressed concerns by sections of the bureaucracy over the gravity of the penal provisions.

• In January 2012, Secretary Manolo Quezon III announced that the President has approved the Malacañang Version embodying their proposed amendments. In early February Secretary Abad transmitted the Malacañang Version to Congress.

• The amendments proposed by Malacañang have been adopted fully in the bill passed by the Senate, as well as in the Committee Report approved by the House Committee and now awaiting plenary action. The key Malacañang amendments include:

a. Expansion of the national security exception by inserting the words “national security” in exception (a). The working version of Congress confined the national security exception to defense and foreign affairs. Inserting the words “national security” gives the Chief Executive greater flexibility in the determination of what information may be kept secret by reason of national security concerns.

b. Introduction of a new exception relating to the President’s presidential communications privilege (or what is more popularly know as “executive privilege”).

c. To address the concerns of the bureaucracy over the gravity of the penal provisions, most of the offenses have been reclassified as administrative offenses. Also, Malacañang introduced a section making good faith on the part of public officials a defense for unlawful denial of information.

d. Malacañang also introduced a number of changes on the list of documents for mandatory publication (posting in websites), including the SALNs of top government officials. They also introduced a number of amendments on the record-keeping standards and publication requirements of laws.

e. The Study Group agreed to a number of balancing amendments proposed by advocates to address possible government abuse of the exceptions. In addition to the reiteration of the jurisprudence that the burden of proving an exception lies with government, it added the following qualifications: the exceptions are to be strictly construed; the exceptions cannot be used to cover-up a crime, wrongdoing, graft, or corruption; the President, the Supreme Court, the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the Constitutional Commissions may waive an exception when they deem that there is an overriding public interest in disclosure. (The Senate also added a judicial public interest override consistent with existing jurisprudence.)

• Any other changes made by the Senate and the House Committee were non-controversial, and respected and kept intact all amendments proposed by Malacañang.

C. Challenges to Passing the Measure in the House of Representatives

• What we though would have been a smooth legislative process after Malacañang’s endorsement of its version (legislative work was suspended for a time to await the result of the work of the President’s Study Group) did not materialize, however. A major obstacle was the lack of cooperation from the House committee chairman, who postponed a number of committee hearings resulting in delays. Also, the non-mention of FOI in the President’s third SONA was regarded by the Committee Chairman as a signal that the bill is not really among the President’s priorities.

• Still, the bill still has a fighting chance of getting passed in the current Congress, given that the Senate version has been approved and there remains time, however short, for the House to take action in the remaining nine session days.

• Even without the President’s certification, the House Committee on Rules, through the Majority Leader, is empowered to declare a bill urgent, and to set the number of days or hours to be allotted for the consideration of the bill in plenary, and when vote on the bill shall be taken. Rule X (Bills, Resolutions, Messages, Memorials and Petitions), Section 52, reads:

“Urgent Bills and Resolutions. – The Committee on Rules, through the Majority Leader, may declare a bill or resolution urgent and consider it in accordance with a timetable. The timetable, prepared by the Committee on Rules, shall fix the date when the bill or resolution must be reported by the committee concerned, the number of days or hours to be allotted to the consideration of the bill or resolution in plenary session, and the date and hour debate must be concluded and final vote taken.”

• Concededly, however, there are a number of obstacles that need to be addressed: the problem with quorum as election nears; the remaining lack of political commitment on the part of the House leadership to pass the measure (which translates also to an uncooperative Committee chairman who is tacked to defend the bill in plenary); the existence of a House faction resisting the bill on the argument that it will be prone to abuse by media and citizens (the “right of reply” proponents).

• In relation to the right of reply issue, one of its vocal proponents (Rep. Rodolfo Antonino), insists on making a provision on right of reply a rider to the FOI bill. Under his proposed provision, whenever there is material published in any media based on information obtained under FOI, any person mentioned in the publication is given the right to have a reply published in equivalent space, under pain of fines and even closure for refusal to do so.

• The advocates have opposed this right of reply rider to the FOI bill as patently unconstitutional, infringing on the freedom of speech and of the press. It intrudes into the editorial prerogatives over clearly protected speech/expression. The advocates appeal instead that the right of reply be tackled in a separate measure (there are separate right of reply bills in both Senate and House) to allow for full-blown discussion among stakeholders without holding hostage the passage of the FOI bill.

• In addition, the Senate version has adopted a provision already addressing the fears of citizen/media abuse of FOI, which is supported by advocates. The authors of the bill in the House intend to adopt a similar provision. Section 20 of the FOI bill approved by the Senate reads:

“SEC. 20. No Abuse in the Exercise of Rights and in the Performance of Duties Under this Act. – Public officials and employees, in the performance of their duties under this Act, as well as citizens in the exercise of their rights under this Act, shall act with justice, give everyone his or her due, and observe honesty and good faith.

Public officials and employees as well as citizens shall endeavor to handle information kept or obtained under this Act with due care, to the end that inaccuracies and distortions are avoided.

Any public official or employee, or citizen who, in the performance of duties or exercise of rights under this Act, willfully or negligently causes loss, damage or injury to another, in a manner that is contrary to law, morals, good customs or public policy, shall compensate the latter for the damage incurred. This is without prejudice to other remedies available to the aggrieved party under any other law for the same acts.

• All things considered, advocates believe that the insistence on a right of reply rider is really a monkey wrench to passing the FOI bill by politicians who are really opposed to the FOI bill per se.

D. Final Push for the Bill in the 15th Congress

• The FOI champions in the House are determined to make a final and determined push for the passage of the FOI bill in the House in the remaining nine days. But they need visible support from all sectors, directed at convincing the House leadership, and the President as well, to make the passage of the FOI bill a priority when session resumes on January 21.

• We call on friends and allies of the campaign, and those who support the passage of the bill, to monitor the events on FOI in the coming 4 weeks. We ask for support for campaign initiatives, such as through media coverage, attending House sessions, and directly asking members of the House for their support.

• We encourage everyone to speak on FOI in all platforms (print, broadcast, online and social media). Be heard on FOI!

‘SC Justices and their wealth’ showing tonight on SolarTV

Ed Lingao Leave a comment

PCIJ SOLAR LOGOS

SOLAR NEWS, the newest news channel in the Philippines, airs tonight (January 11) the results of a collaborative investigation between Solar News TV and the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism into the wealth of the justices of the Philippine Supreme Court.

The Justices and their Wealth is a one-hour special on the contents of the statements of assets, liabilities, and net worth (SALNs) of the SC Justices. As well, the special looks into the refusal of the high tribunal to make public the asset records of the officials of the judiciary. This, even as all other officials in the other branches of government are required to make full and public disclosures of their asset records as required by the Constitution and Republic Act 6713, or the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees.

The one-hour program is based in part on several months of investigating by the PCIJ on the SALNs of the justices, their fat allowances, and their many other perks. The print and online versions of the story came out beginning December 9, 2012, with SC justices among PH’s best paid, allowances, bonuses not in SALNs; Corona’s fat allowances not taxed: Same, same still at SC?; Rapidly rising net worth shared bliss of SC justices; and Transparency on ice: Judicial independence or impunity?

Solar TV’s special report will be aired at 8 p.m. Manila time on channel 21 for those with free TV; channel 16 for those using SkyCable; and channel 28 for those on Global Destiny.

 

Should gov’t officials disclose their taxes, too?

Ed Lingao Leave a comment

PUBLIC OFFICIALS in the Philippines are required by law to publicly disclose their income and their assets. But since that rule is seldom ever followed, then perhaps government should as well disclose the taxes paid by government officials.

Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) founding director and Tony Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism director Sheila Coronel poses this proposal in her latest story in her investigative journalism blog Watchdog-Watcher.

Coronel argues that since government officials are supposed to set a good example for tax compliance, and since they are required to publicly declare their income anyway, then it follows that officials should also tell the public how much they pay in taxes. This is to show the public that government officials pay the right taxes. As well, this allows the public to cross-check their tax declarations against their declared income.

“Because they (officials) decide how the burden of tax payments is shared, then citizens should be told whether those they elect to office are carrying their fair share of that burden,” Coronel writes. “There can be persuasive arguments as to why heads of state, Cabinet ministers, and members of national legislatures should declare their taxes.”

Coronel adds that the disclosure of tax data could serve as an anti-corruption tool which was the case in Pakistan after the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIRP) published its 70-page booklet, revealing that two-thirds of Pakistan MPs “were not even registered taxpayers and therefore had no (National Tax Numbers).”

Read Sheila’s blog here.

Comelec to pols, parties: New year, new politics

Ed Lingao Leave a comment

NEW YEAR, NEW RULES. So get rid of all those old bad election habits.

It’s a warning issued by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to all  politicians, political parties, and local and national candidates running in this year’s midterm elections as it prepares to fully implement and enforce the rules on campaign finance.

In all the decades that Filipinos have been trooping to the polls, this will be the first time that the Comelec will be turning a serious eye on the issue of campaign finance. In all previous elections, the issue of campaign finance, or the dynamics between campaign expenditures and the results of the elections, has only been given token observance.

These issues include the use of state resources for campaigning, the identity and amount of campaign donations, the restrictions and the limits for campaign expenditures, and the quality of the reportage of these donations and expenditures to the Comelec. The Comelec has so far been unable to enforce the laws on campaign finance because it has been so busy with the administrative burden of ensuring peaceful and honest elections.

But with the recent creation of an ad hoc campaign finance unit within the Comelec, the poll body says it will start giving more attention to campaign finance beginning with this year’s elections.

In fact, Comelec commissioner Christian Robert Lim said the campaign finance unit intends the 2013 elections to be a pilot run of sorts for the 2016 Presidential elections, when the contributions and expenses are expected to be much greater.

“We are looking at 2013 as the institutional step going to 2016 and future elections, to start plugging loopholes,” Lim said during a campaign finance seminar-workshop sponsored by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ).

The workshop, which brought together several stakeholders including political parties, the Comelec, the Bureau of Internal Revenue, civil society organizations, and the media, was aimed at getting the stakeholders together to discuss all the issues related to campaign finance that had previously been either of no interest to all but the apparently most obsessive.

This interaction is necessary if all the stakeholders are to have a greater understanding of both their rights and obligations any elections, said PCIJ Executive Director Malou Mangahas.

Lim said the campaign finance unit is hardly fully equipped to do a thorough audit, with only 12 full time lawyers who are also tasked with other jobs in the Comelec. As such, Lim said the unit is looking at a graduated enforcement of the campaign finance rules, so that the Comelec would be better prepared once 2016 comes around.

“We still have a lot of changes to make, but it is a first step in changing how politicians and candidates approach the elections, by not doing it in the traditional level anymore,” Lim said.

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During the workshop, both the regulators and the regulated were invited to raise all the questions and concerns they have regarding campaign finance. For example, representatives from some of the attending political parties expressed concern that that some of the current campaign finance rules that have so far been unenforced were really impractical and impossible to implement fully.

At the same time, some television and radio executives said the Comelec did not have a full understanding of how the broadcast industry works. This understanding is necessary if the Comelec is to enforce either the airtime or the spending limits for political advertisements, which are often exceeded by candidates.

Interestingly, several broadcast executives took the initiative to set a conference with Comelec officials in order to brief the poll body on what really happens between the broadcast networks and the political candidates during the election period.

Lim welcomed the initiative, and said the seminar-workshop on campaign finance is an important signal that all stakeholders are now willing to confront an issue that for many years has been considered too complex to deal with.

At the same time, Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner Kim Henares announced that the BIR would also be seriously looking into campaign expenditures and donations as a means to check whether both campaign donors and candidates have been reporting their income taxes accurately.

This, after the PCIJ noted that some of the biggest donors in the previous elections never seem to crop up in the list of the country’s biggest taxpayers, even though they seem to have all the money and goodwill to spread around during election time.

Henares said the BIR will be carefully scrutinizing the campaign donations and expense reports to see if they tally with the BIR’s own list of taxpayers.

All candidates and political parties are required by law to submit a statement of contributions and expenditures (SECE) to the Comelec after the elections. While winners regularly submit their SECE for fear of disqualification, the Comelec has never had the opportunity to audit and validate the reports for accuracy.

Henares said the BIR will cross check the contribution reports with the bureau’s own list of income tax returns to see if the big contributors have been declaring income in proportion to their donations. Henares and her deputies gamely took part in the campaign finance workshop in order to answer questions related to taxes and the elections.

“We can compare the expenditures by candidates and the ITRs. We are looking at that as one of the areas of cooperation with the BIR,” Lim said. “If we can’t get you by election laws, maybe we can get you by tax laws, like Al Capone.”

Henares also reminded all businessmen that they need to pay taxes for income generated from election activities. Economic activity normally spikes during the election season, as candidates splurge on campaign materials and paraphernalia and spend millions for campaign advertising.

For example, Henares said that the average gross domestic product for 2010 would have just been “four or five percent.” However, the enormous spending during the 2010 presidential election pushed the GDP up to 7.6 percent.

“If the campaign finance reform or mechanism is put in place, it will make people more responsive in reporting whatever income they generate,” Henares said.

“We want to avoid the situation where the basis for a candidate’s winning his seat is because he is the most moneyed,” Lim said. “We want to equalize the situation for all Pinoys.”

 

Will Aquino use his political clout for the FOI bill?

Ellen Leave a comment

Thanks to Interaksyun for this photo.

With a commanding popularity, hardly dented by controversies and bungling, President Aquino’s push makes a lot of difference in passing the most difficult legislations.

We have seen it in the last few weeks.

His certification of the Reproductive Health bill as urgent last week facilitated the passage of the measure which was vigorously opposed by the intimidating Catholic Church.

A few weeks ago, Congress also passed the Sin Tax Reform bill which cigarette and alcoholic drinks companies, with huge lobby money, were blocking.

Those two bills which had always suffered the fate of Mona Lisa dreamers (“They just lie there and they die there” ) now just need the signature of the President to become laws.

With the Sin Tax reform measure, the government expects to collect P40 billion in additional revenues which will be used in the improvement hospitals and health facilities nationwide, providing more health services especially in the rural areas which are also expected to result in healthier Filipinos.

Health experts say that increase in prices of cigarettes and alcoholic drinks, which is the logical effect of higher taxes, would decrease number of smokers by 27 percent.

That would also translate to healthier Filipinos. “This is bigger than the revenue we will be earning from the tax. This is our biggest win,” said Dr. Antonio Dans of the UP College of Medicine, one of the active proponents of the Sin Tax Reform measure together with Dr. Tony Leachon, consultant of the Department of Health on Noncommunicable Diseases.

When the RH measure becomes a law, more and more Filipinos would be empowered to plan their families because there would be easier access to information, materials, and opportunities.

It goes without saying that a healthy and empowered people would be great asset in the economic development of the country.

With a 78 percent approval and 80 percent trust ratings (Pulse Asia nationwide survey Nov. 23 – 29, 2012), would be expected to be a major influence in the May 2013 elections. Members of Congress, many of whom are running in the May 2013 elections, would be courting trouble antagonizing Aquino.

Now that Aquino had shown his political clout in the Sin Tax reform and RH bills, would he do the same for the Freedom of Information Bill, the first versions of which were filed six congresses ago?

Thanks to Inquirer for this photo.

In his sponsorship speech yesterday, Rep. Lorenzo “Erin” R. Tañada III, appealed to the House leadership to facilitate the enactment of the FOI bill into law.

“Before us is a measure that will institutionalize the substantive and procedural details necessary for the effective operationalization of the people’s right to information, enshrined side by side with the great fundamental guarantees to a free and democratic people in our Bill of Rights.

“Iisa po ang buod ng panukalang batas na ito. Karapatan ng ating mamamayan na malaman kung paano ginagampanan ng pamahalaan at ng mga pinuno at kawani nito ang kapangyarihang ipinagkatiwala sa kanya ng taong-bayan, at kung paano nito pinangangalagaan ang kaban ng bayan na nagmula sa pawis at pagod ng mamamayan.

“Totoo po, sinasabi sa mga desisyon ng Kataas-taasang Hukuman na ang karapatan sa impormasyon na ginagaratiyahan sa ika-pitong seksyon ng Article 3 ng ating Saligang Batas ay maaaring hingin ng mamayan kahit walang kalakip na batas ng Kongreso na magpapatupad nito. Subalit sa pang-araw araw na karanasan ng mamamayan, hindi ito sapat upang masiguro ang pagtupad nito. Hanggang saan ang saklaw ng mga impormasyong kailangang ibigay? Ano ang alituntunin sa paghingi at pagbibigay ng impormasyon? Kung ang karapatan sa impormasyon ay nilabag, ano ang kaukulang regulasyon at remedyo ng mamayan?”

Tanada said the FOI bill addresses these concerns.

He traced the history of the FOI bill: “This measure is twenty years in the making. The first FOI bills were filed as far back as the 9th Congress in 1992. While it took the FOI bill practically a generation to reach legislative maturation, those years have been a fruitful process of balancing competing norms in FOI.”

He said it is the passage of the bill would not only be “in recognition of the already very long legislative history of painstaking balancing of interests to reach the present broad consensus on its provisions, but also in keeping with our own commitment to contribute to the lasting reform of our governance institutions.”