Cordillera autonomy bill processed in House, Senate

By Dexter A. See

BAGUIO CITY -- House Bill 5595 which seeks to create an autonomous region in the Cordillera is now undergoing process for approval in the Lower House and Senate.

The bill was approved by the House committee on local government and referred to the House committee on appropriations for the proposed region’s funding as enshrined in the bill and sources of revenues.

Senate Bill 3115 authored by Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III is now pending with the Senate committee on local government chaired by Sen. Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr.=Aalient points are being drafted by the author in preparation for a public hearing to be called for the purpose after the completion of the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato C. Corona.

Originally, HB 5595 was filed by Baguio City Rep. Bernardo M. Vergara, Kalinga Rep. Manuel S. Agyao and Apayao Rep. Eleanor Bulut-Begtang on December 6, 2011. However, Ifugao Rep. Teodoro B. Baguilat, Jr. and Mountain Province Rep. MaximoDalog, Sr. decided to affix their signatures and join the authors of the bill on December 7, 2012.

The contents of HB 5595 was a product of the Third Autonomy Act Drafting Committee (TAADC) created by the Regional Development Council (RDC) in the Cordillera which conducted a series of regional, provincial, city and municipal consultations in 2010 and 2011.

The committee was chaired by Mayor Mauricio G. Domogan with members coming from the provinces of Abra, Apayao, Benguet, Ifugao, Kalinga, Mountain Province and Baguio City as well as the private sector from the aforesaid places.

Because of the growing demand for the conduct of grassroots level of consultations, the RDC-CAR mandated its sectoral committees and key focus areas to include in their mandate information and education campaign on autonomy so that all the concerned sectors in the region will be reached and that their concerns and issues will be addressed by whichever provisions of the pending law.

Domogan reiterated the need to follow a specific timetable in order to keep Cordillerans on their toes and try to internalize the benefits of autonomy to the development of the region. Supposed to be, the autonomy must have passed both chambers of Congress by the middle of this year so that continuous information and education campaign could be done until the scheduled plebiscite which will be determined by the Commission on Elections.

The importance of having the plebiscite earlier than the May 2013 local elections is that the autonomy issue will not be politicized by some quarters so that people will vote in accordance to what the understand about the matter.