The wave of Senate bills seeking to
remove jail time as a punishment for libel following the public fury over the Cybercrime
Prevention Act led me to one big question:
How could have the senators OVERLOOKED
the outrageous penalties for libel in the Act, like the 12-year imprisonment
and Justice Sec. Leila de Lima’s power to block anyone’s access to an Internet
site if she thinks the person is committing the crime, until it was signed into
law?
Was it really simply a case of oversight?
Or did something happen during the deliberations before the Act was signed into
law?
We have VERY SHARP LEGAL MINDS in the
Senate, including the Act’s principal author Sen. Edgardo Angara. Personally, I
found it INCONCEIVABLE that they did not foresee the people’s objection to the
libel provision, especially its penalties.
But now that the public outcry is
UNDENIABLE, there’s a SCRAMBLE in the Senate to decriminalize libel. Not only
in the Act itself but also in the Revised Penal Code.
Nine bills seeking to amend the Code to
remove imprisonment as a penalty for libel have been filed by the senators.
Four of these, WITHIN JUST TWO DAYS of
the resumption of Congress and authored by Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III,
Loren Legarda, Pia Cayetano and Minority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano.
Bottom line, the senators had been aware
all along of the importance of decriminalizing
libel. But curiously, they
seemed to have forgotten this while deliberating on the Act.
Otherwise, the 12-year jail time penalty
for libel would not have escaped their scrutiny.
We can never tell exactly what seemed to
have clouded the vision of the senators who did not object to the inclusion of
libel and its dictatorial punishments in the Act.
But something was WRONG, SOMEWHERE ALONG
THE WAY!
One thing few can be sure of, people, had
we not voiced out our outrage, this flood of bills to decriminalize libel WOULD
HAVE NEVER HAPPENED.
If only for this, we should all keep a
very close watch on our senators. 30
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