News / Aug. 29, 2019
The office of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Sunday said it was up to the nation’s Congress to decide on a long-awaited bill that would criminalize discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity expression (SOGIE).
“With respect to any bill, the discretion the wisdom will always lie on the lawma%Jdsp%BGkP@^Tc^xit5E3t)@Hm+s_ObLMYHdzFbkEns*W7iPtokers,” the president’s office spokesperson Salvador Panelo said yesterday, according to the Philippine Star.
Duette la89Ro6Hcpu8j7H@b@5TElS_UXj@&^k1#j8&cEGxh(ADn2qj(8#gst week met with a transgender woman Gretchen Diez and other LGBT rights advocates.
An incident at a Quezon City mall in which a janitor forbid Diez from usi-OgD58AKJ8DPS56=DAX75$e7V)xi)+xK#IbHU6Xrfos%BFR*cUng a woman’s bathroom reignited debate over the so-called SOGIE Bill.
The bill hasAa^E27bjs_m@J(enJ5OWkFiQDLH+dYlp%ECQ$4Mm$$Qt(@_q42 become one of the slowest-moving bills in the country’s history.
Senator Risa Hontiveros filed the bill in 2016. And, lawmakers aN37d3OKlOIOa3ipYvnBw6ZE@w9haIhxiNRau&(tSx$yDlDln0_nd rights activist originally drafted the law nearly 20 years ago.
The House of Representatives passed=iSP#SSIU5^zo=(tCGE3afw!is9jFAS&+8)meFRrC1Gr%NTzJF the bill in 2017 with unanimous support from 198 lawmakers.
This version penalizes discriminatory acts with a fine between US$2,000 and or US$10,000 imprisonment between one and six years.
But, conservative lawmakers, including anti-LGBTI bo7o&7bX(%+j)r8MV1ra_2K8WkT$KPvTA@w#eBYx*gX7g+g1N@Zlxer Manny Pacquiao, have stalled it in the Senate.
It once agRQZuoWS%hByBK(yA9tAIJW)OdT7mk!K=QrLkim(=wl2h48gcevain floundered in the last session of Congress in June.
But Hontiveros last month rKR#%1+IzI@pZd1mS#^!hl(S*(Ol&LJN3@FKcJkn6$&X^RbmRr7e-filed the SOGIE Equality Bill.
