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A SENIOR
legislator warned on Tuesday that if Congress gives in
to the weak proposal on the country’s archipelagic
baseline, the country will see an oil-drilling
concession under the Chinese government.
PDP-Laban Rep. Teodoro Locsin Jr. of Makati City issued
the warning a day after the House leadership suddenly
made a complete turnaround and deferred the approval of
House Bill 3216, or “An Act Defining the Archipelagic
Baselines of the Philippine Archipelago, Amending for
the Purpose Republic Act 3046, as Amended by Republic
Act 5446.”
“I
really have a feeling in my bones that if we give in to
Malacañang, five years from now, you will discover that
there are oil-drilling concessions under the Chinese
government in those areas,” said Locsin on dwIZ’s radio
program Karambola.
Seeing
it coming, Locsin asked Lakas Rep. Antonio Cuenco of
Cebu, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs
and author of the baseline bill, to help him in the
passage of the e-treason bill to include the willful
alienation of Philippine claims by foreign powers.
Locsin
scored Malacañang for what he described as its mental
dishonesty when it asked House leaders to treat the
Kalayaan Island Group as a “regime of islands” that will
be outside and detached from the main archipelagic
baseline of the country.
Under HB
3216, the country’s archipelagic baseline jurisdiction
would cover the disputed Spratly Islands and Scarborough
Shoal.
In the
same radio program, Cuenco said he and his colleagues in
the House will not abandon their stand on the baselines
bill even as he asked the Senate to help him out in the
Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council and
come up with a version that is beneficial to the
country.
“We will
not abandon our stand, we will push through with our
stand,” said Cuenco.
Cuenco
said he and Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr., who adopted his
baselines bill, are in constant touch regarding the
matter.
In fact,
he said, Pimentel has proposed “Option 5,” if worse
comes to worst.
“Nene
Pimentel and I are in constant touch with each other,
and he is very cooperative. Meron pa nga siyang
Option 5. Ang Option 5 ganito iyan: Iyong
Kalayaan Island Group is composed of 90 islands that are
viable because they are not under water. Marami diyan
lumulubog during high tide. Out of the 90 big
islands, we are in actual occupation of nine. The
Philippines is actually occupying those. Ang
proposal namin ni Nene if worse comes to worst,
na iyong baselines natin should cover the
nine islands, iyong occupied ng China,
Vietnam and Taiwan, eh huwag na muna natin isali,”
Cuenco said.
Pimentel, meanwhile, called on the Senate and House of
Representatives not to succumb to Malacañang’s pressure
to water down the bill delineating the archipelagic
baselines of the
Philippines
by putting the Kalayaan Islands (Spratly Islands on the
international map) and Scarborough Shoal outside those
baselines or territorial boundaries.
Pimentel
said the Palace’s position to treat the Kalayaan Islands
and Scarborough Shoal as a “regime of islands” would
have the effect of weakening the Philippine claim to
those islands over which it already exercises effective
sovereign control.
“The
proposed exclusion of the Spratlys and Scarborough Shoal
is tragic, if not treasonous,” he said.
“It’s
the duty of President Arroyo to assert our territorial
claims forcefully but peacefully.” |
