Visayas group files case vs RH Law

CEBU, Philippines - A group committed to the protection of family and life is seeking that Republic Act 10354 or the Reproductive Health Law be declared unconstitutional in a petition filed before the Supreme Court.

The Task Force for Family and Life Visayas, Inc. through its counsel, Atty. Valeriano S. Avila, named as respondents in the case Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa, Health Secretary Enrique Ona, Interior and Local Government Secretary Manuel Roxas II, Budget Secretary Florencio Abad, and Education Secretary Armin Luistro.

TFFL, in the petition, cited violations of the respondents to the Philippine Constitution when the bill was recently passed and signed into law by President Benigno Aquino III.

The group said RA 10354 violated Section 26, Article 6 of the Philippine Constitution by carrying two subjects – the “Responsible Parenthood” and “Reproductive Health Bill.”

Section 26, Article 6 of the Philippine Constitution provides that “every bill passed by the Congress shall embrace only one subject which shall be expressed in the title thereof.”

The petitioner said that the inclusion of responsible parenthood in the title is “clearly misleading” as it has no provision in the law itself, but only made to make people think the law is about responsible parenthood.

TFFL said the mislabeling of the essence of the Act, which is from contraception to responsible parenthood, must have contributed to its passage into law.

“The sudden insertion of the phrase responsible parenthood in the bill may have been designed to mislead the public into believing that indeed the proposed bill was about responsible parenthood in its true and literal meaning as conveyed by the Church to the people,” the petition reads.

Petitioners insist that the RH law has violated its own guiding principle, which holds the state responsible in respecting the sanctity of the family and strengthening the family as an autonomous institution.

The state also must not interfere with the parents’ primary right and duty in molding their children’s moral character.

Petitioners said the RH Law also has violated the freedom to exercise one’s religion as the law, TFFL believes, clearly goes against the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.

TFFL is a group of men and women committed to the protection of family and life as mandated in the law and the teachings of the Holy Scriptures.

It is duly registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and one of the groups that blatantly opposed the passage of the RH Law.  —/MBG (FREEMAN)