Rep. Teddy Boy Locsin on Proc. 1017

The bright light from the abyss called the Philppine House of Representatives speaks on Proc. No. 1017, here.


"  X X X She (GMA) cannot call out the armed forces to settle political or personal scores, such as raiding the Tribune for attacking her day in and day out, or escape accountability for the misdeeds of her officials, such as Joc-Joc Bolante. To paraphrase Joker P. Arroyo, there can never be an emergency power to conceal crimes or suppress the truth."


" X X X Call the situation what she pleases, but there are things she cannot do under a proclamation of national emergency.

"One is enforcing a warrant of arrest that is 20 years old on a charge that has nothing to do with the current emergency and which history has changed into a piece of flattery. This habit of dredging up stale warrants is worse than illegal, it is baduy, an example of what is called in the vernacular, utak sarhento.

"Two, she cannot cite as the root of the emergency the exercise of fundamental freedoms like speech, press and peaceful assembly. Not even if these freedoms are exercised to discredit her. National emergencies are proclaimed precisely to protect these essential democratic features, never to suppress them, especially in the context of EO 464 stopping officials from testifying, possibly on what are alleged to be her administration's misdeeds. X X X"

" X X X And while she can invoke Article 12, Sec. 17, to take over public utilities when they create or exacerbate an emergency, such as jacking up oil and energy prices, she needs both an act of Congress and a better motive than the dislike that the owners of these utilities have for her. There is no power anywhere in law or the Constitution to compel affection, loyalty, let alone cooperation.  X X X"