Legarda urges IT industry to lobby for DICT bill

By Erwin Oliva - INQUIRER.net

MAKATI City, Philippines -- Opposition Senator Loren Legarda urged the Philippine information technology industry to help lobby for a bill she filed creating the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT).

Speaking before members of the Philippine Internet Commerce Society, Legarda said the bill aims to “give more focus” on ICT in government.

“I encourage you to write 23 members of the Senate urging them to support this bill,” she said in a speech.

Legarda filed the DICT bill at the opening of the 14th Congress, but she said the bill has not yet been referred to any Senate committee.

In an interview with reporters, she said the country needs a department on ICT because this is a “need of the future.”

She said the country is lagging in the development of the IT industry due to lack of a department solely focused on this booming industry.

The DICT is seen to set government policies and oversee government IT projects.

The House committee on information and communications technology is also planning to push a similar bill.

“Any forward-looking Filipino would support this bill. Only those living in the Stone Age would likely be against it,” Legarda added.

She said that previous bills filed in Congress need to be refined and re-filed in Congress.

“A bill is never perfect. We welcome inputs,” she said.

Legarda said she has also filed an anti-computer fraud and privacy bill and an anti-porn bill, which also covers pornography on the Internet. She was, however, against any form of regulation on the Internet.