Arroyo ally presses for bill vs travel ban from DOJ, President

The leader of the opposition at the House of Representatives on Monday urged the chamber’s leadership to immediately act on a measure seeking to remove the power of the President and the Department of Justice (DOJ) to bar accused persons from leaving the country through a hold departure order. House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman wrote a letter to Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. calling for the “expeditious enactment" of House Bill 51111, which he filed last August. “The right to travel has been constitutionalized in the bill of rights as at par with the right of the accused to be presumed innocent until the contrary is proved," Lagman said in his letter. Lagman made the appeal weeks after the DOJ denied former President and Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s request for an allow departure order that will authorize her to seek medical treatment abroad for her bone disorder. Mrs. Arroyo is currently on the Immigration watch list in connection with plunder and electoral fraud charges filed against her. Lagman said “the current controversy on the right to travel underscores the immediacy of enacting" HB 5111. HB 5111 gives the courts the sole power to determine if an accused should be prohibited from traveling abroad based on “competent and compelling evidence." The measure also states that a person should only be barred from traveling abroad for three reasons, as stated in the Constitution: if he or she is a threat to public safety, national security or public health. The measure is currently pending before the House committee on justice. It has to get approval from a majority of its members, and then a majority vote from all House members, for it to be passed by the chamber. - Andreo C. Calonzo/KBK, GMA News