POSSIBLE REBUTTALS

1.
INTERNATIONAL1. The reference to international law, treaties, obligations or
LAW,
TREATIES, conventions does a very little to further the cause of the
OBLIGATIONS
OR government.
CONVENTONS
Let me first say this, that there is nothing in international
law which would support their claim that a foundling should
be accorded with Natural Born Citizenship.
It is worth emphasizing that conventional international laws
have only the status of statutes and legislative enactments.
As such, they cannot supersede or transcend the
provisions embodied in the constitution. To put it in simpler
terms, treaty obligations and covenants has to bow down
to the constitution.
As laid down in the recent case Bayan Muna vs Romullo:
Under international law, there is no difference between
treaties and executive agreements in terms of their binding
effects between the contracting states, as long as the
negotiating functionaries remained within their powers.
Neither, on the domestic sphere, can one be held valid if it
violates the constitution

2. CRS
AND
CONVENTION

a. The International Covenant on Civil and Political

rights (ICCPR)
b. Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
c. Convention on the Rights of a Child (UN CRC)
- All of these conventions does not provide
that a foundling, shall ipso facto be accorded
with Natural Born Citizenship status to the
party state.
HAGUE Finally with respect to Convention on the Reduction of
Statelessness (CRS) and 1930 Hague Convention, the
Philippines are not a signatory to both conventions.
Being a non-party both treaties are not biding to the
Philippines. Hence, the government cannot validly invoke

the provisions of CRS and Hague Convention.

As what is established in the recent case Pharmaceutical
Health Care association of the Philippines vs Health
Secretary Duque III:
In order for the treaties or conventional International Law to
be valid, it must go through a process prescribed by the
constitution for it to be transformed into municipal law that can
be applied to domestic.

3. CUSTOMARY
INTERNATONAL LAW

We agree, that Customary International Law, or generally

accepted principles of International, is deemed
incorporated in our legal system and shall form part of the
law of the land by virtue of Section 2, Art II of 1987
Constitution. But this has to satisfy the following elements:
1. Established, widespread, and consistent practice on
the part of the states; and
2. Psychological practice known as opinion juris sive
nessitates (opinion as to law or necessity). The
practice in question is rendered obligatory by the rule
of law.
Having the burden of proof, the government has not
provided us any proof that the recognition of foundlings as
NBC of the country of which they were found has become
an established, widespread and consistent practice among
states.
Granting they can provide us that some states indeed
practice it, the states that are signatories to both
conventions are pretty underwhelming considering that in
CRS, only 64 out of 197 states ratified the said convention,
and this is also true to the 1930 Hague Convention.
Meaning that it cannot be presumed as customary
International law without showing that majority if ot all
states adhere to such practice, which has become in itself

4. THE LAW IS SILENT

established, widespread and consistent. It adheres to the

general rule that it needs to be proven by sufficient
evidence.
With all due respect the law never included foundlings as
natural born citizens expressly or impliedly included
foundlings in its terms.
The silence of Article IV, Section 1, of the 1935 Constitution
on the citizenship of foundlings in the Philippines in fact
speaks loudly about their legal situation.