The Reproductive Health Bill pending in Congress and the Reproductive Health Ordinance of Davao City pending at the City Council are not tantamount to legalizing abortion.

In a privilege speech in yesterday’s regular City Council session, councilor Angela Trinidad-Librado, RH Bill supporter and RH Ordinance proponent, said there is no provision in House Bill 5043 or the Reproductive Health and Population Development Act of 2008 that promotes abortion.

“It is simplistic to equate abortion and condom with the RH Bill,” she said.

Librado said under the law, abortion is still considered as a punishable crime.

She said what the RH Bill is offering is the freedom of each individual to decide.

“It is about the right of promoting information, the right of to be protected from early child bearing, from unwanted pregnancy, and from contacting sexually transmitted diseases including HIV,” she said.

Librado said data show that teenage deaths due to abortion are rising.

She said she has talked to barangay captains and they have told here that two of the burgeoning problems they are facing are teenage pregnancy and high risk pregnancy.

Although there are seemingly similar programs that the government is implementing on RH, these programs are still not enough. The bill, according to Librado, would provide funding for the implementation of the programs listed.

But councilor Teresita Mata-Marañon said the bill is not needed by the country right now.

She said if the government would try to control the population, “we would become like the countries in Europe where the aging populace outnumbers the younger populace.”

“If we are outnumbered by the old, who will take care of them?” she said.

Marañon also said since the mortality rate outnumbers the birthrate, there is no need for a population control bill.

For his part, councilor Diosdado Mahipus gave a privilege speech in which he said that while he is pro-life, there is a need to control the country’s population.

“The problem of educating the Filipino children is getting worse and so is the hunger mitigation… Overpopulation leads to graft and corruption, also to expensive election, also to housing problems,” he said.

“It also leads to flood because forests are being cleared to make room for housing,” he added.

As of this writing, the Council has not yet deliberated on the ordinance supporting HB 5043 and the RH Ordinance of Davao City.

Floor leader Danilo Dayanghirang in a phone interview said they might take up the matter next week.

The ordinance has already been deferred twice: first due to the absence of Librado who was sick last week and second because of time constraint yesterday. Diana Lhyd Suelto