House Committee on Legislative Franchise Chairman Franz Alvarez has urged the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) to enable ABS-CBN Corporation to continue operating by providing a provisional permit, while the lawmakers discuss its renewal application.
Furthermore, Alvarez also claimed that the panel has begun to discuss ABS-CBN’s franchise renewal fairly and objectively.
Alvarez said, “We also want to restate our letter to the NTC that while deliberation of the franchise renewal bill is pending at the Congress, that ABS-CBN be allowed to continue their operations. We know that emotions run high in the issue of the renewal application. We are doing this meeting to be fair and objective in our deliberations, as we treat the ABS-CBN as a very significant player in the broadcast industry.
“We may expect some members to become emotional on the matter at hand and setting up ground rules will ensure orderly proceedings in our hearings.”
The committee is open and will wait for the votes regarding the giant network’s franchise renewal until April 15, 2020. As of the moment, there are seven organizations, a local government unit, two individuals, and a regulatory agency who have cast their votes for the position papers.
On the contrary Atty. Larry Godon said that NTC has no right to issue a provisionary permit to the giant network and accused Alan Peter Cayetano and Alvarez of being ignorant of the law.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court decided to postpone the Quo Warranto petition filed by SolGen Jose Calida against the ABS-CBN network and discuss the legal case on April 14, 2020 for the summer session in Baguio City.
“Yes, I confirm that the deliberations by the court on the ABS-CBN Quo Warranto petition is still on going. The case will again be included in the agenda of the court on April 14, 2020 when it starts its summer session in Baguio. The Justices need more time to further study the case,” Supreme Court Spokesperson Brian Keith Hosaka said.
It can be recalled that the giant network responded to Calida’s Quo Warranto as “without merit” and they are law compliant. Right before the meeting for franchise renewal in Congress started, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman claimed that the said meeting is “just for the show.”
