CEBU CITY, Nov. 17 — Proposed amendments to the Reproductive Health (RH) bill won’t be acceptable as it must be rejected entirely, a “pro-life” congressman said on the second day of Philippines for Life Congress 2011.
“Regardless of what house bill number or whatever name or title you call it, once this bill is passed, it will be implemented in accordance with the intent of people who stood behind it and pushed it all these years. That is why we must reject the RH bill in its entirety, regardless of content and form,” said Davao Rep. Karlo Alexei Nograles.
Nograles described the “voluntary amendments” being offered by the RH bill’s proponents as “questionable.”
One of the proposed amendments is in the bill’s Section 13 which says “health workers and volunteers shall be capacitated to give priority to family planning work.” The line “give priority to family planning work” is supposed to be replaced with “help implement this act.”
The paragraph that reads “parents shall exercise the option of not allowing their minor children to attend classes pertaining to reproductive health and sexuality and education” will supposedly be placed in Section 16, while sections 20, 21, and 28 will be deleted.
“These are the amendments that are intended to satisfy us as their way of compromise, but these amendments, in actuality, have not yet been introduced. A promise to amend is not equivalent to the actual amendment. Second, the promise to amend by members of the House does not include the Senate. In other words, these amendments may still be found in the final Senate version [of RH bill],” the lawmaker said.
“Third, and more importantly, these amendments do not satisfy [pro-lifers] because what [pro-lifers] demand is a total rejection of the RH bill in whatever content or form,” Nograles said.
Meanwhile, Dr. Rene Josef Bullecer, director of Human Life International-Pilipinas, which organized the conference, said “global contraception equals global devastation.”
He enumerated the consequences of the “contraceptive mentality,” saying that with the wide use of different artificial contraceptives comes the “abolition of man in the face of the earth.”
“[Among the side-effects of using birth control pills are] possible infertility, thereby segregation of fertility and sex, increased chlamydia, gonorrhoea, child pornography, more unstable relationships, destruction of the family, and massive decline in population,” Bullecer said.
Other speakers today were Valeriano “Bobit” Avila, writer and columnist of the Philippine Star and Freeman newspapers; and Bishop Gabriel Reyes of Antipolo. Gervie Kay S. Estella
