Cebu solon files joint reso seeking to extend ABS-CBN franchise until June 2022

Cebu City Representative Raul Del Mar has filed a measure seeking to extend the franchise of ABS-CBN until the end of the 18th Congress on June 30, 2022.

Del Mar filed House Joint Resolution 28 amid the ongoing issue on franchise renewal of the TV network before the House of Representatives.

Del Mar said he filed the measure as a way for Congress to express its sense that it was allowing ABS-CBN to continue its operations even as the bills renewing its current franchise for another 25 years have yet been deliberated.

"The hearings on the renewal application [of the ABS-CBN franchise] will not be finished before the break now," Del Mar said in a phone interview.

"This being so, we have to do something, how to normalize the situation and allow ABS-CBN to continue its operations even after their franchise expires on March 30," he added.

Del Mar said there was a need for a "simpler and quicker reinforcement" at the House to allow ABS-CBN to continue operating.

"This is the next best thing to express the sense of Congress that we allow ABS-CBN to continue operations until such time has a final decision by a vote of the majority of the House and the Senate after on the application of renewal," Del Mar said.

A joint resolution needs to approval of both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

In the Senate, Senator Franklin Drilon has already expressed intention to file a concurrent resolution to allow ABS-CBN to operate until the end of the 18th Congress.

Currently, there are 11 bills filed at the House of Representatives seeking to renew the franchise of ABS-CBN, but the House Committee on Legislative Franchises has yet to conduct formal deliberations on the matter.

Its chairman, Palawan Representative Franz Alvarez, however, announced on Monday that the panel is now open to accepting position papers for or against the renewal of the ABS-CBN franchise, signalling the start of the proceedings of the chamber.

He said that once all positions papers have been taken into consideration, the panel can formally start deliberating on the ABS-CBN franchise renewal bills.

This, however, could take place either in May or in August, after Duterte's State of the Nation Address is delivered. —NB, GMA News