Presumptive presidential candidate for 2016 Senator Grace Poe has a lot of explaining to do in connection with her citizenship and residency. The Senate Electoral Tribunal will be asking questions in the wake of allegations that she is not a natural-born Filipino and that she lacked the residency requirement when she ran for the Senate.
On Grace’s being a foundling left by her biological parents at a church in Jaro, Iloilo, some legal practitioners and so-called experts allege that she is natural born by virtue of Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, which provides “A foundling found in the territory of a Contracting State shall, in the absence of proof to the contrary, be considered to have been born within the territory of parents possessing the nationality of the State.”
The United Nations adopted this convention in an effort to do away with statelessness of people. However, this convention did not enter into force until 1975, when Grace Poe, already adopted by Ronald Allan Kelly Poe, otherwise known as Fernando Poe Jr. or “FPJ,” and Jesusa Sonora Poe, known as Susan Roces, was already seven years old! And according to a memorandum from Department of Justice, the country acceded to the convention only in 2011 when Grace, whose full name is Grace Poe Llamanzares, was already married to an American citizen and gave birth to American children.
Records make it worse for Grace. The Department of Foreign Affairs has reportedly been unable to confirm the DoJ report, and there is no record that the President has ratified the convention with the concurrence of the Senate.
Article VI, specifically provides that “no person shall be a senator unless he is natural-born citizen of the Philippines, and on the day of the election, is at least thirty-five years of age, able to read and write, a registered voter, and a resident of the Philippines for not less than two years immediately preceding the day of the election.” This is clear and precise.
The second whammy against Grace is that after the death of her adopted father, Fernando Poe, she returned to the Philippines and filed a petition “for retention and/or reacquisition of Philippine Citizenship under Republic Act 9225, known as the “Citizenship Retention and Reacquisition Act of 2003. This law provides that “any provision of the law to the contrary notwithstanding, natural-born citizens of a foreign country by region of naturalization as citizen of a foreign country are hereby deemed to for have reacquainted Philippine citizenship upon taking the oath of allegiance to the Republic.
In the case of Grace, when she got married to her husband, an American citizen, she undertook an oath of allegiance to the United States of America. Thus, she lost her Philippine citizenship. It is not known whether or not she also worked under the US government. Another thing, under the implementing rules of the Bureau of Immigration, Circular No. AFF-04-01, which provides: “These rules shall apply to former natural-born citizens of the Philippines as defined by Philippine laws and jurisprudence, who have lost their citizenship by reason of naturalization as citizens of a foreign country.’’ The same Circular requires, a former natural-born citizen of Philippines, who was born in the Philippines, shall submit the NSO-authenticated copy of his or her birth certificate as proof of his or her former “natural-born” status. The question now is: Did Grace submit the mandated NSO-authenticated copy of her birth certificate? She must answer this question.
The third whammy, which, to my mind, is the most crucial allegation Grace must explain, is this: In 2006, she filed a notarized petition for retention and/or reacquisition of Philippine citizen under RA 9225. She declared under oath: “I am a natural-born Philippine citizen born on September 3, 1968 at Iloilo City to Ronald Allan Kelly Poe, a Filipino citizen, and Jesusa Sonora Poe, a Filipino citizen; I became an American national on October 18, 2001, thereby lost my Philippine citizenship. Pursuant thereto, I am a holder of a US passport with Passport No. 017037793, issued on Dec. 19, 2001 in Washington.”
My gulay, that’s a complete misrepresentation. It’s a big lie. She herself had claimed to be a foundling. FPJ and Susan Roces, as far as records show, were childless. Santa Banana, Grace could be guilty of perjury and thus disqualified as a senator and a would-be presidential candidate because she is not natural-born as required by law.
And when she declared in her Certificate of Candidacy as a senator in the 2013 polls for the Senate, she must have been honest enough to write that her residency was only for six years and six months. This would disqualify her for the presidency, which requires at least 10 years at the time of the presidential elections in 2016.
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The prolonged rally of members of the Iglesia Ni Cristo along Edsa is definitely a show of force to compel President Aquino to act one way or another.
From the looks of it, the President is now a bind on how to act. If the President supports the case filed against INC council members since, to my mind, illegal detention and abduction are serious criminal offenses and have nothing to do with “Separation of Church and State,” much less “interference of internal affairs” of INC, and consequently, throws support for De Lima as he should to follow the rule of law, the Iglesia becomes his enemy.
What is critical is what the President would do next. It could make or break him.
But as we see it, the President who usually doesn’t hesitate to defend his alter egos, right or wrong, is treating the Iglesia issues with kid gloves.
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I cannot agree with all the criticisms and personal attacks on Metro Manila Development Authority Chairman Francis Tolentino.
He has been doing everything to the point of wading in floodwater and personally directing traffic at congested areas. I challenge his critics and all those who want Tolentino to resign: Can they do better?