CAMIGUIN ISLAND - A businessman here and 24 others filed a petition for a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the so-called Smart Tourism Ordinance of the province which they alleged to be a form of controlling local Camiguenos.
Paul Rodriguez, a businessman led the group of 25 Camiguin petitioners to ask the local court to issue a TRO “against the despotic and unconstitutional QR Code ordinance, which the provincial government continues to enforce, throughout the island last July 19”.
Rodriguez said the QR code “enabled the ordinance to control the people’s right to travel and mobility, especially those of their critics, political and business rivals --- more than a year after President Marcos lifted all Covid-19 restrictions”.
The Smart Tourism Ordinance requires that a person prior to visiting the island, beyond the seaport, airport, or other authorized entry points in Camiguin, can only be allowed after his or her personal data has been acquired and a QR code has been scanned.
Counsel for the petitioners, Attorneys Barbara Ocaba, Frances Margaret Aparte, and Anna Katrina Rodriguez, claimed that the QR code “violates several provisions of the Bill of Rights such as monitoring the movement of tourists, and does not warrant continuing the implementation of the QR Code system, hence should be “urgently nullified”.
The petitioners said the ordinance “violates the right to privacy based on the Data Privacy Act, which requires the expressed consent of the data source or the person”.
The case has its first hearing on Monday in the sala of Judge Nanette Lao of Branch 28, Regional Trial Court of Mambajao, Camiguin. However, the counsel for the Provincial Government led by its Provincial Legal Officer, Atty. Pol Ochavillo, filed a Motion to Inhibit Judge Nanette Lao to try the case, on the grounds that allegedly one of the lawyers for the case used to be an employee of the previous sala of Judge Lao.
Rodriguez said Judge Lao voluntarily inhibited herself from trying the case and moved the case to be raffled and tried at a Cagayan de Oro court. PR