CONGRESS may not be able to pass the long-delayed Freedom of Information bill this year because lawmakers will be preoccupied with passing next year’s national budget, Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez said Sunday.
He said there would be a slim chance that Congress will take up the FOI bill since they would be busy deliberating on the P3.35-trillion budget for 2017.
“Due to time constraints, we will miss out on the passage of the FOI bill within the year,” Alvarez said.
“From now until about November, that period will be devoted to the budget hearing. Let us see if we can pass it [the FOI bill] by next year.”
Alvarez made his statement even as Malacañang on Sunday released the proposed Freedom of Information manual.
The 30-page manual will be reviewed as the Justice department and the Office of the Solicitor General have listed 166 exceptions to President Rodrigo Duterte’s executive order implementing an FOI mechanism in the executive branch.
A draft of the FOI Manual of the Presidential Communications Office shows as one of its annexes 158 “exceptions to FOI” and eight more listed as “other exceptions.”
The draft of the FOI manual was released to the media by the Presidential Communications Office on Aug. 22.
Alvarez repeated his commitment to push for the FOI bill’s enactment into law despite another year of delay.
“I have no problem with that [bill]. However, all House committees have not yet been filled in. We still have not come up with the complete membership of each committee,” Alvarez said.
“So give us a little time because, right now, we are also busy in the deliberation of the 2017 national budget.”
Rep. Antonio Tinio said it was a realistic target to pass the FOI bill within the year, although that was just an initial target.
The right to information is enshrined in the 1987 Constitution, but the desire for greater transparency and accountability fueled the filing of the first FOI bill in Congress by the late senator Raul Roco in 1987.
The 16th Congress last year failed to pass the FOI bill, along with the Bangsamoro Basic Law, the anti-political dynasty bill and another bill that would amend the Constitution.
Cebu City Rep. Raul del Mar refiled the FOI bill that would cover the executive, legislative and judicial branches.
President Rodrigo Duterte has urged the House of Representatives to act immediately on the “long overdue” FOI law “to uphold the people’s right to demand information on government affairs, particularly on how their taxes are spent.”