Saturday, February 14, 2009 [ manilatimes.net ]
By William B. Depasupil, Reporter
Oppositors maintain both Senate and House bills are ‘unconstitutional’
RESIDENTS of Malolos City in Bulacan province vowed to oppose all the way to the Supreme Court the proposed conversion of their city into a separate congressional district. They maintained that for being unconstitutional.
The oppositors, led by lawyers Victorino Aldaba and Carlo Jolette Fajardo, on Friday said that they would avail of all legal remedies available following the approval on second reading of Senate Bill No.1986.
Senate Bill 1986 seeks to amend the charter of Malolos City and transform it into a congressional district. The House of Representatives had already approved a counterpart bill, House Bill No.3693, last year.
In a seven-page memorandum, the group stressed that the proposed measure, among others, violates the Constitution’s minimum population requirement.
It pointed out that the bill was passed on second reading without supporting proof that the 250,000-population requirement, as provided for under the Constitution, has been complied with.
Same is true, they claimed, when the House of Representatives approved House Bill 3693.
The only fact on record, the memorandum said, is that the present population of Malolos City is only 223,069 as of August 1st, 2007 as certified by the National Statistics Office (NSO), Bulacan. Before the 2007 Census of Population, the Malolos City population numbered 175,291 in 2000, which showed that the City had an annual growth rate of 3.50 percent.
Projecting the population by 2010, Maloleños will only total to about 247,321, which is below the minimum requirement of 250,000 inhabitants.
Even according to the NSO, the country’s annual population growth from 1995 to 2007 is only 2.16 percent. “Hence, even using any method of projections, there is no way the population of Malolos City can increase to 255,000 in just a year and a half, come 2010.”
“Much defilements and infringement had been perpetrated against the Constitution, regretfully, even by officials of higher echelon levels. We cannot supinely sit by and witness the commission of another one right in our midst,” explained Aldaba, 83, who formerly served as provincial board member, vice mayor and mayor, consecutively.
“We appeal to Senate President Enrile and other senators to disapprove the proposed legislation for violation of the constitutional mandate on population requirement and on prohibitions against gerrymandering,” the oppositors said.
House Bill 3693, authored by Rep. Ma. Victoria Sy-Alvarado was elevated to the Senate on May 6, 2008 and has been approved on second reading on February 10. Senate Bill No. 1986 is sponsored by Senator Mar Roxas.
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