A  lawyer identified with the Church hierarchy petitioned the Supreme Court yesterday to declare as going against the Constitution Malacañang’s population control law or Republic Act 10354, otherwise known as the Reproductive Health (RH) law.
The law is expected to provide billions of pesos in contracts, among other things, for “educational centers” in time for the mid-term elections scheduled this May.
In a 24-page suit, lawyer James Imbong, son of Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) legal counsel Jo Imbong, was joined by his wife Lovely-Ann and their Catholic school Magnificat Child Development Center, in posing the first legal challenge to the law.
Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile had said that a suit against the recently passed RH law may be necessary to settle lingering questions about the constitutional definition on the beginning of life.
At least 11 provisions in R.A. 10354, which allow couples to choose to suppress life, violate the Constitution, the petitioner said.
Named respondents in the petition were Executive Secretary Pacquito Ochoa Jr., Budget Secretary Florencio Abad, Education Secretary Armin Luistro, Health Secretary Enrique Ona and Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II.
The petitioners argued that the RH law “negates and frustrates the foundational ideals and aspirations of the sovereign Filipino people as enshrined in the Constitution.”
They cited Article II, Section 12 of the Constitution which states: “The State recognizes the sanctity of family life and shall protect and strengthen the family as a basic autonomous social institution. It shall equally protect the life of the mother and the life of the unborn from conception. The natural and primary right and duty of parents in the rearing of the youth for civic efficiency and the development of moral character shall receive the support of Government.”
“As regards the value of human life and its sustainance, the Constitution upholds the ideal of an unconditional respect for life and aspires for the establishment of policies that create opportunities to harness the economic potential of every Filipino,” they stressed.
They also alleged that the new law violates Article XV of the constitution, which imposes on the government the duty to “strengthen (family’s) solidarity and actively promote its total development” and provides for “inviolable marriage” and “right of spouses to found a family in accordance with their religious convictions and the demands of responsible parenthood.”
The couple added that the new law violates constitutional freedom of religion and expression of those who will continue to oppose it and also creates doubtful or spurious rights called reproductive health rights.
Because of these violations, petitioners argued that both executive and legislative branches exceeded their boundaries set in the constitution in enacting and passing the law, respectively.
They said there is need to stop the implementation of the new law that “mocks the nation’s Filipino culture — noble and lofty in its values and holdings on life, motherhood and family life — now the fragile lifeblood of a treasures culture that today stands solitary but proud in contrast to other nations.”