{"id":244501,"date":"2020-02-10T03:13:02","date_gmt":"2020-02-10T08:13:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=244501"},"modified":"2020-02-10T03:13:02","modified_gmt":"2020-02-10T08:13:02","slug":"solgen-asks-sc-to-revoke-abs-cbn-franchise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/02\/10\/solgen-asks-sc-to-revoke-abs-cbn-franchise\/","title":{"rendered":"SolGen asks SC to revoke ABS-CBN franchise"},"content":{"rendered":"
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“We want to put an end to what we discovered to be highly abusive practices of ABS-CBN benefitting a greedy few at the expense of millions of its loyal subscribers. These practices have gone unnoticed or were disregarded for years,” Solicitor General Jose Calida said in a statement. (PNA photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0— The Office of the Solicitor General on Monday filed a quo warranto petition before the Supreme Court seeking to forfeit the legislative franchises of broadcasting giant ABS-CBN Corporation and its subsidiary, ABS-CBN Convergence, Inc.<\/p>\n

“We want to put an end to what we discovered to be highly abusive practices of ABS-CBN benefitting a greedy few at the expense of millions of its loyal subscribers. These practices have gone unnoticed or were disregarded for years,” Solicitor General Jose Calida said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Calida said that ABS-CBN had been hiding behind an “elaborately crafted corporate veil”, and alleged that it was allowing foreign investors to take part in the ownership of a Philippine mass media entity by issuing Philippine Deposit Receipts (PDRs) through ABS-CBN Holdings Corp., a violation of the 1987 Constitution.<\/p>\n

Under the 1987 Constitution, mass media ownership is limited to Filipinos.<\/p>\n

“This simply means that mass media companies operating in the Philippines must be 100 percent Filipino owned because they play an integral role in the nation’s economic, political, and socio-political landscape,” Calida said.<\/p>\n

Calida added that the broadcasting firm “abused” the privilege granted by the State when it launched and operated a pay-per-view channel in ABS-CBN TV Plus, the KBO Channel, without prior approval or permit from the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC).<\/p>\n

“While it is true that broadcasting is a business, the welfare of the people must not be sacrificed in the pursuit of profit,” Calida said.<\/p>\n

Calida said ABS-CBN Convergence, Inc. resorted to an “ingenious corporate layering scheme” in order to transfer its franchise without the necessary congressional approval.<\/p>\n

“The legislative franchises of ABS-CBN Corporation and its subsidiary, ABS-CBN Convergence, Inc. must be revoked. A franchise is a special privilege granted by the State, and should be restricted only to entities which faithfully adhere to our Constitution,” he said.<\/p>\n

At least eleven lawmakers filed proposals to take up whether the Lopez-controlled firm’s congressional franchise should be granted when its original franchise expires next month.<\/p>\n

Under the law, the grantees of a broadcasting franchise must secure from the government, through the NTC, the required permits and licenses for their operation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0— The Office of the Solicitor General on Monday filed a quo warranto petition before the Supreme Court seeking to …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":244505,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,16,46,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","category-news","category-entertainment-ph","category-news-ph","mauthors-benjamin-pulta","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244501"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":244507,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244501\/revisions\/244507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}