Senate leaders are spearheading a bipartisan move to challenge before the Supreme Court Malacañang’s termination of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) without the concurrence of the members of the treaty-ratifying chamber.
Minority Leader Franklin Drilon confirmed over the weekend he is joining Senate President Vicente Sotto III and “other administration senators” set to formally file a petition in the High Tribunal questioning the Executive’s solo act.
“This will be a bipartisan move to assert the Senate’s role in foreign policy,” said Drilon, pointing out that “while the President is the chief architect of foreign policy, the Constitution is clear that such a very critical role is shared with Congress, particularly the Senate.”
At the same time, Drilon disclosed in an interview with radio station DWIZ that Senate President Sotto conveyed plans by majority senators to file the petition, and had invited him to be a coauthor —an offer he accepted, he said.
A former Justice Secretary, Drilon stressed that since the Constitution is silent on the termination of treaties and international agreement, “it is only the Supreme Court that can rule with finality on the issue.”
He added: “The Supreme Court should rule on this issue once and for all. We cannot continue putting the fate of critical treaties such as the VFA, which termination has far-reaching consequences, in the hands of one man.”
Drilon declared, “it is our firm belief that if treaties and international agreements the President entered into cannot be valid without the approval of the Senate, the termination of, or withdrawal from, the same should only be effective with the concurrence of the Senate.”
Moreover, he argued that “once ratified and concurred in by the Senate, a treaty or an international agreement becomes part of the law of the land. Hence, a treaty may not be undone without that shared power that put it into effect.”
It will be recalled that Drilon, in 2018, was joined by Minority Sens. Francis Pangilinan, Paolo Benigno Aquino IV, Leila de Lima, Risa Hontiveros, and Antonio Trillanes IV in filing before the Supreme Court a petition to declare the Philippines’s withdrawal from the International Criminal Court (ICC) “invalid or ineffective.”
Drilon declares that “once the SC ruled in favor of the ICC petition, the termination will be deemed invalid and the membership of the Philippines in the ICC will continue,” adding that “the VFA will benefit if the SC upholds the power of the Senate.”
In a statement, Drilon renewed his call for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, chaired by administration senator Aquilino Koko Pimentel III, to finally report out Senate Resolution 305 seeking to assert the role of the Senate in treaty termination or withdrawal.
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