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Marikina City Mayor Teodoro supports dev’t of local anti-discrimination ordinance

Cognizant that LGBT Pride parade happens only once a year, Marikina City Mayor Marcy Teodoro says he supports the push of the LGBTQI community to have an anti-discrimination legislation; and if a national law won’t be passed, he expressed willingness to legislate a similar local ordinance.

Marikina may have hosted Metro Manila’s annual LGBTQI Pride gathering for two years in a row (2017 and 2018); and it may have held its own autonomous Pride parade in 2016, but the city does not have an anti-discrimination policy that protects the human rights of its LGBTQI people.

“If the national (offices) can’t legislate at their level, perhaps we could initiate one here in Marikina the soonest possible time,” Marikina City Mayor Marcy Teodoro said to Outrage Magazine.

Speaking to Outrage Magazine, Marikina Mayor Marcy R. Teodoro said that hosting Pride is a way to show the city’s support to Metro Manila’s LGBTQI community, particularly since his office in particular supports this community’s push for a nationally enacted anti-discrimination policy.

But with the continuing failure of the anti-discrimination bill to pass – this time in the Senate, with the bill in Congress passing in late 2017 with the help of the likes of Reps. Geraldine Roman and Kaka Bag-ao – “if the national (offices) can’t legislate at their level, perhaps we could initiate one here in Marikina the soonest possible time.”

SOGIE Equality Bill passes House of Representatives

The onus now is on the LGBTQI community – particularly those in Marikina City – to take Teodoro at his words by developing an anti-discrimination ordinance that will eventually be sent to Teodoro’s office for approval.

In the end, Teodoro said, “we want to be known as an inclusive community. We can only do that by recognizing everybody as all equal to each other.”

The founder of Outrage Magazine, Michael David dela Cruz Tan completed BA Communication Studies from University of Newcastle in NSW, Australia; and Master of Development Communication from the University of the Philippines-Open University. He grew up in Mindanao (particularly Kidapawan and Cotabato City), but he "really came out in Sydney" so that "I sort of know what it's like to be gay in a developing, and a developed world". Conversant in Filipino Sign Language, Mick can: photograph, do artworks with mixed media, write (DUH!), shoot flicks, community organize, facilitate, lecture, and research (with pioneering studies under his belt). He authored "Being LGBT in Asia: Philippines Country Report", and "Red Lives" that creatively retells stories from the local HIV community. Among others, Mick received the Catholic Mass Media Awards in 2006 for Best Investigative Journalism, and Art that Matters - Literature from Amnesty Int'l Philippines in 2020. Cross his path is the dare (guarantee: It won't be boring).

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