OVER ANTI-TERROR ACT

Locsin calls comparison between HK, Philippines 'extraordinarily stupid'

Department of Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin, Jr. on Tuesday considered a Filipino opinion writer's  piece "extraordinarily stupid"  for drawing parallels between Hong Kong under China's National Security Act, and the Philippines under the Anti-Terrorism Law.

Opinion writer Antonio Montalvan II in an article posted in Al Jazeera said that President Duterte's new anti-terror law is strikingly similar to the draconian security legislation China imposed on Hong Kong.

In a tweet on Tuesday, Locsin said that the comparison is stupid as the Philippines' anti-terror act consists of amendments from the opposition.

In his opinion piece, Montalvan said,  "Strikingly similar legislation, which was signed into law in the Philippines by President Rodrigo Duterte around the same time, however, failed to garner the same level of international media attention and public outcry." 

However, "local whiner" Montalvan's opinion piece finds favor with an earlier pastoral letter by the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines signed on 12 July 2020 by acting CBCP president Bishop  Pablo Virgilio David.

In the pastoral letter, the CBCP draws similarities with Hong Kongers under China's National Security Act, and Filipinos under the anti-terror law, saying that the [specter] of the iron policy in HK seems to "sound eerily familiar" to us Filipinos, because we are in a similar situation." —LBG, GMA News