REPUBLIC ACT NO. 4528 - AN ACT GRANTING ERMITA ELECTRONICS, INCORPORATED, A FRANCHISE TO ESTABLISH, MAINTAIN AND OPERATE RADIO BROADCASTING STATIONS AND RADIO STATIONS FOR DOMESTIC AND INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS

Section 1.    Subject to the provisions of the Constitution, as well as of the Act Numbered Three thousand eight hundred forty-six, entitled "An Act providing for the regulation of radio stations and radio communications in the Philippine Islands, and for other purposes;" Act Numbered Three thousand nine hundred ninety-seven, known as the Radio Broadcasting Law; Commonwealth Act Numbered One hundred forty-six, known as the Public Service Act, and their amendments, and other applicable laws not inconsistent with this Act, Ermita Electronics, Inc., is hereby granted a franchise to establish, maintain and operate radio broadcasting stations and radio stations for the reception and transmission of messages in the foreign and domestic public fixed point-to-point, public base, aeronautical, land-mobile and including coastal marine service with the corresponding relay stations for the reception and transmission of wireless messages on radiotelegraph and/or radiotelephone, radioteletype, radiophoto, facsimile, music, pictures, advertisements and such other types of emission from or to foreign countries and within the Philippines and with vessels at sea and aircrafts over the air, irrespective of whether such vessels and aicrafts are within or without the Philippines.

Sec. 2.    This franchise is likewise made upon the express condition that the grantee shall provide adequate public service time to enable the Government, thru its stations, to reach the population on important issues, shall assist in the function of public information and education, shall conform to the ethics of honest enterprise, and shall not use its stations for dissemination of deliberately false information or willful misrepresentation, or to the detriment of the public health and morals, or incite, encourage or assist in subversive or treasonable acts.

Sec. 3.    The grantee's radio broadcasting stations shall not be put in actual operation until the Secretary of Public Works and Communications shall have allotted to the grantee the frequencies and wave lengths to be used under this franchise and issued to the grantee a license for such use.

Sec. 4.    The grantee shall not require any previous censorship of any speech, play, act, or scene or other matter to be broadcast from its stations; but if any speech, play, act or scene or other matter should constitute a violation of the law or infringement of a private right, the grantee shall be free from any liability, civil or criminal, for such speech, play, act or scene or other matter: provided, that the grantee, during any broadcast may cut off from the air the speech, play, act or scene or other matter being broadcast if the tendency thereof is to propose and/or incite treason, rebellion or sedition, or the language used therein or the theme thereof is indecent or immoral.

Sec. 5.    The grantee shall hold the national, provincial, and municipal governments of the Philippines harmless from all claims, accounts, demands or actions arising out of accidents or injuries, whether to property or to persons, caused by the construction or operation of the stations of the grantee.

Sec. 6.    The Secretary of Public Works and Communications, on reasonable notice to the grantee, may at any time change, or cancel, or modify, in whole or in part, any or all of the allotments of frequencies or wave lengths to be used. He may take such action: (1) whenever in his judgment such frequencies and wave lengths have been used, or there is danger that they will be used by the grantee to impair electrical communications, or stifle competition, or to obtain a monopoly in electrical communications or to secure unreasonable rates for such communications, or to violate otherwise the laws or public policy of the Philippine Republic; (2) whenever in his judgment the public interest of the Republic of the Philippines require that such frequencies or wave lengths should be used for other purposes than those of the grantee, either by the Government of the Philippines or by other individuals or corporations licensed by it; and (3) whenever in his judgment, for any reason, the public interests of the Philippines so require.

Sec. 7.    (a) The grantee shall be liable to pay the same taxes on its real estate, buildings and personal property, exclusive of the franchise, as other persons or corporations are now or hereafter may be required by law to pay.

Sec. 8.    A special right is reserved to the President of the Philippines in time of war, rebellion, public peril, calamity, emergency, disaster, or disturbance of peace or order, to take over and operate the said stations or to authorize the temporary use and operation thereof by any department of the Government without compensating the grantee for the use of said stations during the period when they shall be so operated.

Sec. 9.    The President of the Philippines shall have the power and authority to permit the construction of said stations or any of them on any land of public domain upon such terms and conditions as he may prescribe.

SECTION 10.    This franchise shall continue for a period of twenty-five years from the date the first of said stations shall be placed in operation and is granted upon the express condition that same shall be void unless the construction of one or two stations be begun within two years from the date of the approval of this Act.

SECTION 11.    The grant, its successors or assigns, shall so construct and operate its radio stations as not to interfere with the operation of other radio stations maintained and operated in the Philippines.

SECTION 12.    No private property shall be taken for any purpose by the grantee, its successors or assigns, without proper condemnation proceedings and just compensation paid or tendered thereof, and any authority to take and occupy land contained herein shall not authorize the taking, use, or occupation of any land except such as is required for the actual necessary purpose for which the franchise is granted.

SECTION 13.    The grantee shall keep a separate account of the gross receipts of the business transacted by it in the Philippines and shall furnish the Auditor General and the Treasurer of the Philippines a copy of such account not later than the thirty-first day of January of each year for the preceding year. All the books and accounts of the grantee pertaining to its business shall be subject to the official inspection of the Auditor General or his authorized representatives, and the audit and approval of such accounts shall be final and conclusive evidence as to the amount of said gross receipts, except that the grantee shall have the right to appeal to the courts under the terms and conditions provided in the laws of the Philippines.

SECTION 14.    As a condition of the granting of this franchise the grantee shall execute a bond in favor of the Government of the Philippines in the sum of fifty thousand pesos, in form and with sureties satisfactory to the Secretary of Public Works and Communications, conditioned upon the faithful performance of the grantee's obligations hereunder during the first three years of the life of this franchise. If after three years from the date of the acceptance of this franchise, the grantee shall have fulfilled the same, the aforesaid bond shall be cancelled by the Secretary of Public Works and Communications.

SECTION 15.    Acceptance of this franchise shall be given in writing within one year after approval of this Act. When so accepted by the grantee and upon the approval of aforesaid bond by the Secretary of Public Works and Communications, the grantee shall be empowered to exercise the privileges granted thereby.

SECTION 16.    The grantee shall not lease, transfer, grant the usufruct of, sell or assign this franchise, nor the rights or privileges acquired thereunder to any person, firm, company, corporation or other commercial or legal entity, nor merge with any person, company, or corporation organized for the same purpose, without the approval of the Congress of the Philippines first had. Any corporation to which this franchise may be sold, transferred or assigned, shall be subject to the corporation laws of the Philippines now existing or hereafter enacted, and any person, firm, company, corporation or other commercial or legal entity to which this franchise is sold, transferred, or assigned shall be subject to all conditions, terms, restrictions and limitations of this franchise as fully and completely and to the same extent as if the franchise has been originally granted to the said person, firm, company, corporation or other commercial or legal entity.

SECTION 17.    In the event of any competing individual, partnership or corporation receiving from Congress a similar franchise in which there shall be any term or terms more favorable than those herein granted, or tending to place the herein grantee at any disadvantage, then such term or terms shall ipso facto become part of the terms hereof, and shall operate equally in favor of the grantee as in the case of said competing individual, partnership or corporation.

SECTION 18.    The franchise hereby granted shall be subject to amendment, alteration, or repeal by Congress of the Philippines when the public interest so requires.

SECTION 19.    This franchise shall not be interpreted to mean as an exclusive grant of the privileges herein provided.

Sec. 20.    This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

Approved: June 19, 1965