Time running out on AMLA, FOI bills

MANILA, Philippines - Time is fast running out on at least three important bills that many leaders and members of Congress want to approve.

The Senate and the House of Representatives will be in session for only six more days - three this week and three next week - before going on a long four-month adjournment until after the May elections.

The three proposed laws that many lawmakers want to get approved this week or next are the Anti-trust bill, the Freedom of Information (FOI) bill and the measure containing changes in the Anti-Money Laundering Act (AMLA).

The House has already approved its version of the AMLA bill, which seeks to expand the list of covered crimes and institutions.

However, upon motion of Minority Leader Danilo Suarez, several business entities proposed to be required to report suspicious transactions, including casinos and real estate companies, were spared from such requirement.

In the Senate, its version of the proposed AMLA changes is still on second-reading plenary consideration.

Sen. Joker Arroyo is proposing the imposition of huge fines and other penalties on banks involved in money laundering, which proposal is apparently encountering some resistance from some of his colleagues.

He cited the recent case of Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, which had agreed to pay United States authorities some $1.9 billion in fines in connection with charges that it was involved in laundering drug money.

In the case of the FOI bill, the Senate has already passed its version. In the House, authors failed to sponsor their version last week after Davao del Sur Rep. Marc Douglas Cagas threatened to question the quorum.

Assuming the House is able to pass the FOI measure this week on second reading and on third-final reading next week, there will be no more time for a bicameral conference to reconcile the two chambers’ versions.

This means that the FOI bill will be dead, unless President Aquino certifies it as urgent.

The same fate awaits the anti-trust bill, which Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. wants approved.

Belmonte has said the enactment of an anti-trust law was one of the concerns consistently raised by local and foreign businessmen in his several dialogues with them in the past.