COTABATO CITY --- “There are competitions, professionally and entity-wise, but there are solidarity when a welfare of one is a concern of all members of the fourth estate in this part of the country, “ said National Union of Journalists in the Philippines (NUJP) - Cotabato City president and The Mindanao Cross correspondent John M. Unson in joining media entities to the call of the passage of the Freedom of Information Act (FOI). Last August 14, the 26-year pending bill celebrated the International Freedom of Information Day, but until then it has remained unapproved but is fully revised and readily awaiting President Benigno Aquino III’s approval. Cotabato City media takes part in the petition of all media entities in the country to let the FOI Act pass the Congress, Senate, and President’s table. “We support the NUJP’s national directorate on the FOI Bill for once enacted, it will hasten governance and improve the consciousness of public officials to be as transparent as they can, while being accountable at all times to the people they serve,” said Unson. NUJP, Kapisanan ng mga Broadcasters sa Pilipinas, and all other major media organizations have already voiced out their call to Aquino, the Senate President, and House Speaker to lead their respective institutions in immediately enacting the FOI law. Unson further said “whatever activity the national directorate wants the chapters in the countryside to do, we shall just to help push forward the enactment of the FOI Bill.” The media has spoken for their own in the social media, prints, and radio celebrating their freedom to information day, saying that “the right to freedom is our protection against government abuse.” Unson said “expression of support, manifested through individual reportage, is enough. We here are even more anxious on the passage of a regional version of the Freedom of Information Bill by the 27-seat Regional Legislative Assembly in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, while looking forward to the enactment of the FOI Bill now pending at the Congress.” The FOI Bill has already reached the Senate plenary, gaining Senator Teofisto Guingona’s vowed full support and chairperson of Senate committee on public information and mass media Senator Gregorio Honasan who renamed the bill as People’s Ownership of Government Information. (AYESHA MAE O. GAYAO)