‘Phl security more important than possible legal infirmities in EDCA’

MANILA, Philippines - The country’s security should have preeminence over possible legal and technical infirmities in the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) with the United States, the Philippine Constitution Association (Philconsa) said yesterday.

Retired justice Manuel Lazaro and Leyte Rep. Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, chairman and president of Philconsa, respectively, issued separate statements on the EDCA at the group’s membership meeting Thursday night in Makati City where US Ambassador Philip Goldberg was the guest speaker.

Goldberg expressed optimism the Supreme Court would declare EDCA constitutional after some groups sought its scrapping.

Lazaro said some sectors have been asking Philconsa’s position on the matter.

“Anything that goes for securing the country will supersede any other technical and legal infirmities that it may seemingly pose. The ultimate goal of the Constitution is to secure the nation, anything that lends to that, we’re supportive,” Romualdez said.

“At the end of the day, the Philconsa is for protecting and defending the Constitution, the Constitution talks about securing the Filipino people, anything that enhances this ability we are supportive of,” he said.

He said Goldberg raised convincing arguments regarding the importance of EDCA to both countries.

Lazaro said to question EDCA for alleged violation of Section 25, Article 18 of the Constitution prohibiting foreign military bases, troops or facilities, except under a treaty concurred to by the Senate, “is to sire a constitutional collision with the imminent or cardinal duty of the government and its citizens to secure the sovereignty of the State and the integrity of its national territory.”

Goldberg said the EDCA simply allows increased rotational presence of US troops in the country in an arrangement that is already allowed under the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty and the 1999 Visiting Forces Agreement.

He also said the EDCA would help the Philippines build a minimum credible defense capability in the light of increasing foreign intrusions in the West Philippine Sea.

“The reason it took eight months and eight rounds of formal and informal negotiations is because we have a concern in issues regarding sovereignty in the Philippines,” Goldberg said.

“We wanted to make sure that it would meet the constitutional requisites, to make sure that it would hold up to scrutiny, legally and politically,” he said.

He said the joint military activities, which include humanitarian operations, would “be determined through mutual consent at locations and at sizes that are mutually beneficial and to be decided together through the Mutual Defense Board, through discussions. Nothing will be done without the consent of the Philippine government.”

The agreement is “mutually beneficial” and “one that won’t go forward unless we both agree,” the US diplomat said.

“It’s one that doesn’t create new bases, it creates the ability for the United States to be present here on rotational basis,” he said.

More anti-EDCA groups

But while Philconsa has declared support for EDCA, more groups have come out to move for the scrapping of the agreement.

The Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) and the Confederation for Unity, Recognition and Advancement (Courage) have filed a petition with the Supreme Court – the third petition against EDCA – questioning the constitutionality of the deal.

In their petition, KMU and Courage alleged that EDCA violates provisions on national sovereignty, territorial integrity and interests, freedom from nuclear weapons and autonomy of local government units in the charter.

“EDCA means the massive deployment of US military troops and weaponry into the country unprecedented since World War II. All freedom- and nation-loving Filipinos should stand up against it. We should not allow the US or any foreign power to re-occupy the Philippines,” petitioners said.

KMU and Courage asked the high court to issue a temporary restraining order (TRO) on the implementation of the deal.

“EDCA’s wholesale violation of the Philippine Constitution emphasizes the fact that it means the re-occupation of our country by a foreign power and is another insult to the country’s so-called independence,” Courage president Ferdinand Gaite told reporters during the filing of the petition.

The first two petitions were filed last May 26 and 27 by a group led by former senators Rene Saguisag and Wigberto Tañada and militant lawmakers led by Bayan Muna Representatives Neri Colmenares and Carlos Zarate.

The SC, last June 3, ordered the Palace, the Department of National Defense and the Department of Foreign Affairs to answer the petitions.

Petitioners have argued that EDCA is a treaty and not merely an executive agreement – as the Palace has claimed – which needs concurrence of the Senate before it can be implemented.

Because of this, they said the agreement violates Section 25, Article XVIII of the Constitution, which requires that any foreign military bases, troops or facilities “shall not be allowed in the Philippines except under a treaty duly concurred in by the Senate.”

They also alleged that the deal also violates Section 8, Article II of the Constitution, which prohibits nuclear weapons in the country.

Petitioners further alleged that the deal is disadvantageous to the government. For instance, they said American troops will be exempted from taxes and fees in the use of public utilities, thus depriving the government of its power of taxation.

The groups also believed that EDCA promotes the MDT, which is inconsistent with the Constitutional provision rejecting war as a national policy.

EDCA, they said, contradicts the country’s obligations as a member of the United Nations, which has outlawed the use of force as a means to settle disputes between states. – With Edu Punay