{"id":254041,"date":"2020-05-06T05:40:56","date_gmt":"2020-05-06T09:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=254041"},"modified":"2020-05-06T05:40:56","modified_gmt":"2020-05-06T09:40:56","slug":"solon-seeks-provisional-franchise-for-abs-cbn-up-to-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/05\/06\/solon-seeks-provisional-franchise-for-abs-cbn-up-to-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Solon seeks provisional franchise for ABS-CBN up to 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
In filing House Joint Resolution No. 30, Rodriguez said both the House of Representatives and the Senate need more time to review, assess, and determine whether or not ABS-CBN shall be granted a new franchise. (File photo<\/a>: Rufus B. Rodriguez\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez on Wednesday filed a joint resolution seeking to grant shuttered media giant ABS-CBN a provisional franchise good up to the life of the present Congress on June 30, 2022.<\/p>\n

In filing House Joint Resolution No. 30, Rodriguez said both the House of Representatives and the Senate need more time to review, assess, and determine whether or not ABS-CBN shall be granted a new franchise.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am filing today a new joint congressional resolution granting the temporary franchise. I am hoping we can expedite the hearings on this measure amid the Covid-19 pandemic even if we have to hear all stakeholders through the new normal videoconferencing platform,\u201d Rodriguez said.<\/p>\n

The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) on Tuesday ordered the network to halt the operations of its television and radio broadcasting stations nationwide following the expiration of its franchise.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez also filed House Bill 6694 seeking to grant ABS-CBN a new franchise valid for 25 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has to be a new grant and no longer a renewal since the radio-tv station\u2019s franchise already expired midnight of last May 4,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez said it was unfortunate that the NTC \u201cchose to ignore the collective voice of the House and the Senate for it to issue a provisional authority to ABS-CBN to allow it to pursue its broadcast services.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow the remedy is for the House to speed up its hearings on my proposals for a temporary franchise and for the grant of a new 25-year broadcasting service privilege,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez also proposed that Congress include in any legislative franchise it would grant in the future an authority for the NTC or any concerned regulator to provisionally allow a franchisee with an expired franchise and a renewal application pending with the House to continue operating until its application is rejected.<\/p>\n

The NTC, in a cease-and-desist order dated May 5, said ABS-CBN must cease its broadcast operations \u201cdue to the expiration of its congressional franchise\u201d on May 4.<\/p>\n

It ordered ABS-CBN, which has more than 11,000 employees, to halt the operations of its 42 television stations across the country, 10 digital broadcast channels, 18 FM stations, and five AM stations.<\/p>\n

ABS-CBN\u2019s franchise expired on May 4 following the House of Representatives\u2019 failure to act on the 11 pending bills that seek to renew the 25-year franchise of the local media giant.<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said Duterte could not certify the franchise bills as urgent because of \u201cprivate interest\u201d involving ABS-CBN.<\/p>\n

It is improper to certify as urgent the bills for the franchise renewal of ABS-CBN, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve not seen any franchise bill to have been certified as urgent by the President. So in that sense, no certification is forthcoming because it is for all intended purposes a private bill that grants a privilege to a private company. I don\u2019t think it is proper to have it certified as urgent,\u201d Roque said.<\/p>\n

Only the legislative branch has the \u201cprimary and exclusive\u201d power to decide on ABS-CBN\u2019s fate, he said, adding that the House can now start deliberating on the pending franchise bills since the session of Congress resumed on May 4.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez on Wednesday filed a joint resolution seeking to grant shuttered media giant …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":245482,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-254041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-filane-mikee-cervantes","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254041","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\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254041"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254041\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":254042,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254041\/revisions\/254042"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245482"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}