THE National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) on Thursday said it backtracked on its vow to grant ABS-CBN Corp. provisional authority to operate pending congressional deliberations on bills seeking to renew its congressional franchise, out of respect to Congress which has the sole power to grant franchises.
Under threat of being cited in contempt and arrested for reneging on the commitment made in March, NTC officials apologized to the House of Representatives for reneging on its promise and for issuing a cease and desist order on May 5, which forced the network to go off the air.
“Please rest assured that we intended no disrespect whatsoever towards Congress. On the contrary, it was precisely NTC’s full respect and recognition for Congress’ sole prerogative that led it to desist from issuing a PA (provisional authority) and, thereafter, to conclude that it was legally bound to issue a CDO,” the NTC said in a letter to the House leadership.
The letter was signed by NTC Commissioner Gamaliel Cordoba who gave the promise on March 10, Deputy Commissioners Edgardo Cabarios and Delilah Deles, and legal branch head Ella Blanca Lopez.
The House last Monday gave the NTC 72 hours to explain why it should not be cited in contempt for closing down ABS-CBN after assuring lawmakers that the network will be issued a provisional authority to operate. The order was contained in a letter emailed to the NTC by Palawan Rep. Franz Alvarez, chair of the House committee on legislative franchises.
ABS-CBN’s 25-year franchise expired on May 4.
Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano last Wednesday said that while there is nothing more important than prioritizing the fight to defeat the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, the NTC’s act has forced the House to act on the franchise bills. The House, also on Wednesday, approved on second reading a bill seeking to grant the media network a provisional franchise to resume operation until the end of October while Congress is deliberating on several bills seeking to renew its expired 25-year franchise.
Cayetano has said all the NTC had to do at the very least was inform Congress that it could no longer make good on its promise to grant a provisional authority because “this piece of legislation may have been acted upon (by the House) then.”
The NTC admitted its failure to notify the House of its decision to issue a CDO against ABS-CBN.
“We are deeply saddened as well for the inconvenience we may have caused Congress. Again, we express our contriteness and sincere apologies for the ensuing confusion this has caused, not the least because we are in the midst of a crisis,” it said.
The NTC said it could have exercised “more openness and prudence under the circumstances and, at the very least, alerted Congress of NTC’s inability based on legal grounds to issue the PA as well as its subsequent decision to issue a CDO when the franchise of ABS-CBN expired.”
CALIDA WARNING
In the past months, the NTC said, it had to “rigorously” sift through various legal arguments, opinions of legal luminaries, stakeholders, and concerns of other sectors, on how to legally support the issuance of a provisional authority.
The NTC also admitted that it “considered” the comment submitted by the Office of the Solicitor General (Jose Calida) that the issuance of a provisional authority is “contrary to the Constitution, the law, and jurisprudence which vested upon Congress the sole power to grant or renew a franchise.”
“Correspondingly, the OSG cautioned the NTC that its issuance of the PA would make its members liable for criminal prosecution,” the NTC said.
In the end, the NTC said, the “collective assessment was that the Constitution, the laws, and jurisprudence, provided insurmountable obstacles to the issuance of a PA, notwithstanding equitable considerations.”
“If the NTC were to issue a PA, it would have amounted to an encroachment into the exclusive domain of Congress. We understand that the licensing power of the NTC may only arise from the necessary delegation of power from the Congress through a law. NTC would thus abide by any law passed by Congress which may extend all telecommunication and broadcasting legislative franchises that expired during the public health emergency, if there be any,” it said.
Alvarez said his panel will consider the NTC officials’ explanation and the apology in resolving whether or not they should be held in contempt.
“We shall advise the NTC in due course of the committee’s actions with regard to the foregoing matters,” he said.
BACK IN JUNE?
Cayetano said ABS-CBN may return on free TV and radio by the first week of June at the soonest, depending on when House Bill No. 6732 will be enacted.
“If everything goes well, God willing, we finish it on Monday (we finish) on final reading. Tuesday, it will be in the Senate. If the Senate can do it in one week, the week after next, latest first week of June, it’ll be on the air again,” Cayetano told dzMM.
The Speaker could not say if President Duterte will eventually sign the measure into a law but said the President, himself, has said he has forgiven ABS-CBN for failing to air his campaign ads in 2016.
“If he (Duterte) asks me, I’ll just say, ‘Sir, this is only for following due process,” said Cayetano, principal author of the measure.
In a separate interview with ABS-CBN anchor Ted Failon on Wednesday night, Cayetano said he does not want his term as Speaker to end in October without having finished deliberations on the network’s franchise application.
“And Ted, I don’t want to wash my hands. October is the date when we’ll change the Speaker so I don’t want my term to end and say, ‘There was no hearing, there was no time,” he said.
The Speaker said the House is eyeing hearings between August and September to give more time to the Senate to also tackle the measure.
COMPROMISE
Senate majority leader Juan Miguel Zubiri said the Senate will try to convince the House to extend the provisional franchise to at least a year.
Zubiri said the five-month period during which the temporary will be on effect franchise might not be enough to tackle all the issues involving the network, especially now that the government is busy combating COVID-19. He noted Congress will go on break in October.
Zubiri said he is confident the provisional franchise will be approved by the Senate on June 3. He said senators will act on the bill immediately after the House transmits it to the Senate. He said he expects the bill to be passed on second reading on May 25 and on third reading on June 2, and ratified on June 3.
Sen. Francis Pangilinan questioned the passage of HB 6732.
“In a few hours after its filing, the Committee of the Whole approved HB 6732 on first and second reading, and is expected to vote on it on third reading early next week… According to the Constitution, Article VI Section 26. (2) 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 its 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,” he said.
Deputy speaker Neptali Gonzales II disagreed with Pangilinan, saying what the Constitution requires is that the first, second and third reading must be done on separate days.
“It does not require three separate days. I submit that the first and second reading may be done on separate days or on the same day, depending on the decision of the plenary, without violating the Constitution for as long as the third reading will be three days after distribution of printed copies (of the bill),” he said.
If the bill is certified urgent by the President, he said, the approval on second and third reading may be done on the same day.
“In other words, there is nothing wrong to lump together in the same day the first and second reading of a bill and conduct the third reading on a separate day because of the three-day rule, unless certified by the President,” Gonzales said.
He said the best example of a bill approved on first, second and third readings on the same day is the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act passed last March 23 by the House, which was a certified measure. — With Raymond AfricA
