Senators bent on lifting GMA’s ‘gag’ rule By Angie M. Rosales 08/06/2010

Senators bent on lifting GMA’s ‘gag’ rule

By Angie M. Rosales 08/06/2010 Malacañang aides won’t get away again with snubbing Senate hearings and invoking Executive Order 464, commonly known as the gag rule that was imposed by former President Gloria Arroyo. This was the vow of Senate Majority Floor Leader and chairman of the committee on rules, Sen. Vicente “Tito” Sotto, as senators are out to lift the gag order, which has effectively crippled the upper chamber’s investigations on alleged anomalies during the incumbency of the previous administration. “This time around, we won’t let this happen. We will approve our rules (at the soonest time possible) to prevent that from happening again,” Sotto stressed, referring to their move defeating the invocation of the controversial EO 464 of the Arroyo administration, should the current Aquino administration seek to implement the same under the 15th Congress. Aquino’s Malacañang earlier said it was still undecided on whether to retain EO 464, but it is likely that the gag rule will be retained by the present Malacañang occupant. It was also unclear how the senators can circumvent this gag rule, as the Supreme Court in the case of then Neda director general Romulo Neri’s refusal to answer the questions posed by the senators during a hearing on the ZTE-NBN scandal regarding a bribe try, upheld Neri’s right not to reply to the questions as he said he was covered by executive privilege.... MORE Source:  The Daily Tribune URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20100806hed5.html

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