Sen. Tito Sotto denies inventing story on son's death

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MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Vicente "Tito" Sotto III on Wednesday fired back at his critics, calling them "callous" and "insensitive" for questioning his claim that his son died due to side effects of contraceptives.
Sotto singled out former Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral and Iloilo Rep. Janet Garin for questioning his earlier statement that his wife's contraceptive use caused their son's heart condition, which later killed him.
"I would like to take exception to statements made by Esperanza Cabral, former secretary of health during the time of Gloria Arroyo, and to a certain extent Congresswoman Janet Garin," he said.
"I find their statements callous and insensitive and it is unfortunate that the reproductive health debate has come to this level. They should have given the sorrow of my family more respect," he added.
Cabral earlier dared Sotto to produce his son's death certificate and hospital records to show the actual cause of death of the 5-month-old baby.
She noted that Dr. Carmen Enverga-Santos, obstetrician of Sotto's wife Helen Gamboa, is already dead and cannot confirm or belie Sotto's claim.
Garin, meanwhile, said Sotto should consider suing the doctor for the mental anguish she caused by linking contraceptives to Vincent Paul's death. She said Sotto's wife might not have been taking birth control pills  under doctor's supervision.
On Thursday, Sotto produced his son's death certificate, saying he will give copies to advocates of the Reproductive Health Bill.
"Bibigyan ko sila ng kopya. Baka akala nila di ko papatulan," he said.
He also said his wife used Diane Birth control pills under the supervision of Dr. Santos.
"She was supervised by her doctor while using it. Intelihente naman po yung asawa ko. Alam niya kung paano gumamit nito," he said.
Sotto said even his own mother, Dr. Herminia Castelo-Sotto, agreed that Vincent Paul's heart condition was linked to Gamboa's contraceptive use. He noted his mother was a staunch women's rights activist and the first Medical Commissioner of Workmen's Compensation Commission of the Department of Labor and Employment.
"Ayon sa kanila (Sotto and Santos), ang pagbubuntis ng aking maybahay na si Helen kahit may contraceptives at gagamit ng contraceptives ay maaaring naging sanhi ng complication, prematurity at eventually pagkamatay ng anak namin. Bakit ko iimbentuhin ang katotohanang ito?" he said.
Contraceptives are abortifacients
Sotto reiterated that contraceptives are abortifacients and pose serious health risks to women and children born to mothers who use contraceptives but still get pregnant.
He challenged his critics to answer him point by point instead of attacking his character via posts on Facebook and Twitter.
"May mga nananakot pa. Kung sa mga drug lords hindi ako natakot, sa kanila pa," he said.
The senator said he does not intend to call for a complete ban on contraceptives nor does he intend to stop people from using contraceptives. However, he said it is his duty as a lawmaker to study the implications of the Reproductive Health bill on all Filipinos.
He said the book "The Greatest Experiment Ever Performed on Women: Exploding the Estrogen Myth,"
 by Barbara Seaman, shows the serious side effects of estrogen use. He said the book showed that in a  cohort of 50,282 preganancies, 19 children with cardiovascular defects were born to 1,042 women who received female hormones during their pregnancy.
"I don't need to be a doctor to know the possible complications on children from women who take birth control pills but still get pregnant," he said.

Sen. Tito Sotto cries during RH Bill Speech

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MANILA, Philippines – Comedian-turned-senator Vicente "Tito" Sotto broke down on the senate floor on Monday when he delivered his speech against the Reproductive Health Bill admitting that his stance was not without personal bias.

Sotto revealed that he had an offspring who died due to complications which he believes arose from his wife, the actress Helen Gamboa-Sotto, having used birth control pills.

Doctor's advice

His voice cracking, Sotto recalled that it was a doctor friend who suggested that his wife take contraceptives so she could continue with her showbiz career.

"Helen got pregnant again even while taking pills,” Sotto recounted. 

Born with a weak heart, the child, a boy, he said, never left the hospital subsequently dying only five months later.

He went on to relate that Monday was supposed to be his son’s 37th death anniversary.

Sotto said he had initially questioned why his son was taken so soon. “But now I realize it happened because I have a job to do—to warn people about the dangers of contraceptives.  That is my mission now,” he said.

On Sharon

Sotto said he never made public the incident prior and that he simply let people believe that he and his wife Helen had only four children, namely Romina, Diorela, Gian and Ciara.

“Actually we have six. Helen and I consider Sharon (Cuneta) our firstborn since we eloped in 1969.  That’s why I call (Senator Francis) Kiko (Pangilinan) my son-in-law,” he said.

Cuneta is the daughter of his wife’s sister, Elaine with former Pasay City mayor Pablo Cuneta.

A Similar Fate

During his speech, Sotto cited that each of his fellow senators, actor Lito Lapid and RH bill principal sponsor Pia Cayetano, knows how it feels to lose a child. Lapid’s son, Sotto said, was a blue baby who died when he was nine. Cayetano’s son, he said, also suffered congenital problems and lived for only nine months.

“My fellow senators have their sad stories, but I still think they are blessed because they were able to hold and embrace their children. I could only watch my son through the glass. I never got to hold him,” Sotto said sobbing.

In the end, RH Bill principal sponsor, Cayetano opted to defer her response to the speech.

ANC Alerts reported, however, that Cayetano disagreed with most of the points Sotto raised in his speech allegedly saying that "many of the data he mentioned are either inaccurate or outdated."

Twitter-bashed

Actress and prolific pole dancer Ciara Sotto, who was on the senate floor to show support for his father, admitted to getting emotional hearing his speech.

"Of all places!!!! I never thought I'd shed tears in the senate," she posted via Twitter.

She also revealed that to this day, her mother is wont to visit a nursery owing to the tragedy.

Sotto became defensive after several netizens took to criticizing his father's stance over the controversial bill.

“My parents experienced losing a child. Bashers/haters can't change that fact. Sana it won't happen to any of you,” she said.

The actress expressed her dismay towards several users of the site.

“[D]aming bastos sa Twitter grabe! Ang lilinis eh... Hiyang hiya naman ako sa kalinisan nila! Kawawa naman daddy ko,” she said.

After another user asked her to not involve herself in the issue, Sotto bravely said, "No, I will not shut up when it comes to my family. I hope one day, if u have ur own child, he/she will b proud enough to stand up for u."

Cong. Gloria Arroyo and 7 allies junk Reproductive Health bill

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Like Batman in the hit movie “The Dark Knight Rises,” former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is emerging from the pits to help defuse fears of a population bomb.

Seven of Arroyo’s allies had withdrawn as authors of the controversial reproductive health (RH) bill that the Catholic Church vehemently opposes.

As such, the Pampanga representative has become the darling of the Church hierarchy, some of whose prelates were gifted with SUVs when she was the President but unfortunately had to give them up following a Senate inquiry.

Wearing a neck brace and lumbar support, Arroyo showed up for the first time in a year—the past eight months under hospital arrest on election sabotage charges—in the House on Tuesday.

The former President, who is being treated for a rare neck ailment, described her appearance there as a “dry run” for the crucial vote on August 7 on the RH bill. She said she would vote against the Malacañang-backed measure.

“This is an issue that she feels strongly about as a devout Catholic, although she never used her term in the presidency to push things her way,” House Minority Leader Danilo Suarez said Wednesday. “But now, as a member of Congress, she will be free to vote [with] her heart and her mind.”

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) announced Wednesday that it was opening its doors to Arroyo at a Mass prayer rally it was leading against the RH bill on Saturday at the Edsa Shrine.

“All anti-RH people are welcome to join us on Saturday,” said Fr. Melvin Castro, executive secretary of the CBCP Episcopal Commission on Family and Life.

“Regardless of the political party or affiliation, every single vote versus the RH bill is welcome for us,” he said in a phone interview.

Suarez also announced yesterday that he and six other lawmakers had withdrawn as coauthors of House Bill No. 4244, which essentially seeks to bring down the country’s population growth rate. The turnaround of the seven, brings to 20 the number of congressmen opposing the bill.

Turning water into wine

The CBCP earlier expressed confidence that as many as 140 congressmen were opposed to the RH bill, with only 49 in favor of the measure.

Representative Edcel Lagman, chief architect of HB 4244, ridiculed the CBCP position, saying “Catholic bishops extrapolate the votes against the RH bill like turning water into wine.”

“The bishops forget that the miracle of life should not result in the death of the mother, and the quality of life of children must be enhanced by empowering parents, couples and women to freely and responsibly determine the number and spacing of their children,” he said in a statement.

Lagman insisted that “RH authors and advocates have the numbers inside and outside the Congress.”

“Legislators are fully aware of the realities on the ground about gripping mass poverty spawned by an inordinately huge population growth rate because couples and women in the marginalized sectors do not have access to correct reproductive health information and effective supplies and services,” he said.

A matter of conscience

The August 7 vote would decide if interpellation should be closed and the process of approval of the bill be moved forward. Some 20 more members will still question authors of HB 4244 on the floor. In the Senate, Senator Pia Cayetano complained on Tuesday that the  leadership had not moved to end debates on the measure, putting it in limbo.

“Changing your mind is no joke,” Suarez said. He said that  “conscience” played a role in the minority members’ reversal of position.

Suarez and his six colleagues formally informed Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. of their decision in a letter dated July 30. Belmonte’s office officially received the letter Wednesday and Suarez gave a copy to reporters.

It carried the signatures of Representatives Suarez, Orlando Fua (Siquijor),  Reena Concepcion Obillo (Una Ang Pamilya), Mohammed Hussein Pangandaman (Lanao del Sur), Nasser Pangandaman (AA Kasosyo), Elmer Panotes (Camarines Norte) and Pastor Alcover Jr. (Anad).

Isabela Representative Rodolfo Albano Jr., also part of the 28-member minority and a supporter of the RH bill, on Wednesday said he was now rethinking his position. He admitted that he was “convinced by the reasoning and interpellation” done by Deputy Minority Leader Milagros Magsaysay on the bill.

“I’m looking at it conscientiously and [I will] come out with a [final] decision,” he said in a joint press conference with Suarez.

Suarez and his six colleagues arrived at their decision to abandon the RH measure following a caucus on  Monday.

“We’re talking about human life here. It’s not taxation. It’s not about economics or boundaries or dispute with other nations, treaties,” he recalled telling the group. “No, we’re talking of human life.”

Fears of marching order

Suarez said he was hoping that congressmen would vote on the move as a matter of “conscience.”

He said: “There should be no marching order from the administration because honestly, I’ll be scared if the administration issues a marching order.”

Suarez said he  himself was convinced to reject the RH bill after being exposed to other countries that had adopted a similar measure to control their population growth. Those  countries, he said, were saddled with problems of an insufficient labor force because the death rate was now greater than the number of children being born.

“Our component is the people—they’re our asset. Yet we will control [population growth]?” he argued. “That’s the reason why I had second thoughts and [withdrew] my support [for the RH bill].”

But unlike other opponents of the RH bill, Suarez was in favor of including in the Department of Health’s budget for next year a program providing free vasectomy and ligation.

Warning on pork

Also on Wednesday,  CBCP president and Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma warned Malacañang against withholding congressional pork barrel allocations of lawmakers who would take the Church’s stand against the controversial family planning measure.

Over Church-run Radio Veritas, Palma said the government cannot use as leverage the allocations to sway Congress into passing the RH measure.

“It has no reason to hold lawmakers’ allocations in the countryside development fund because that belongs to them, that belongs to the people,” said Palma.

But Palma admitted that these lawmakers could suddenly change their decision if the government would dangle the pork barrel in exchange for their votes to pass the bill.

“It could change their decision but our legislators should not be afraid because we know that the government could not forever withhold what belongs to the people,”  Palma said.

Lipa Archbishop Ramon Arguelles also appealed to legislators to vote according to their conscience.

“Just consider the future of your children and grandchildren … look at what’s happening to many countries in the West, they are becoming weak [so] I appeal to the congressmen [for them] to see the reality,” said Arguelles, vice chair of the CBCP Episcopal Commission on Family and Life.