The bills seeking to grant Ginebra resident import Justin Brownlee a Filipino citizenship hurdled the committee level during the hearing of the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights on Monday, Nov. 21.
Committee chair Sen. Francis Tolentino moved for the approval of the Senate Bill No. 1516 and Senate Bill No. 1336 filed by Senators Ronald "Bato" Dela Rosa and Sonny Angara, respectively, after receiving no objections from government agencies invited such as the Department of Justice, the Bureau of Immigration, the Office of the Solicitor General, and the National Bureau of Investigation, among others.
The approval of the bills came almost a week after a counterpart measure filed by 1Pacman party-list Rep. Mikee Romero also passed its first reading in the House Committee of Justice last Wednesday, Nov. 16.
During the proceedings, Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas executive director Sonny Barrios and Gilas Pilipinas team manager Butch Antonio vouched for Brownlee’s character and the impact of his naturalization to the campaign of Gilas Pilipinas in the very hectic schedule next year.
“Sinisiguro po namin na makakabuti po siya sa ating national team at ikinararangal po namin na ipropose sya for naturalization,” said Barrios.
“Nasabi po ni Sen. Bato (Dela Rosa) ‘yung kanyang karakter ay talagang kapuri puri. Kahit sa PBA kahit yung mga kilalang so called enforcers and sabi eh hindi namin masaktan si Brownlee kasi napakabait, ganun ho yung kanyang reputation,” he added.
Brownlee, who was still on his Barong Tagalog, and would occasionally answer questions from the panel with "opo", said that he fell in love with how the Filipinos treat each other no matter how hard life is.
“It’s really just how people get along and how everyone treats one another. Just being in the US, there’s a lot of hate, there’s a lot of diversity and stuff like that and I just always see how people, less fortunate and just happy and they just get along, everybody knows how to treat each other,” said the Kings import
The bills, both from the House of Representatives and the Senate, will then go through discussions in the plenary until the third and final reading before transmitting it to the Office of the President for the signing into a law.