Philippine Competition Commission
The Philippine Competition Commission is an independent, quasi-judicial body formed to implement the Philippine Competition Act. The PhCC aims to promote and maintain market competition within the Philippines by regulating anti-competition behavior. The main role of the PhCC is to promote economic efficiency within the Philippine economy, ensuring fair and healthy market competition.
The Philippine Competition Commission creates a regulatory framework for market competition in order to safeguard consumers, with the goal of providing them with more alternatives for what goods or services to purchase. It would also have the effect of creating competitive businesses that would encourage economic efficiency and innovation.
The Philippine Competition Commission was formed on January 27, 2016. Since that time, the Philippine Competition Commission has formed offices through their mandate.
History
The Philippine Competition Act or Republic Act No. 10667 is the primary competition law of the Philippines. It aims to promote and protect market competition in the country. It protects the well-being of consumers and preserves the efficiency of competition in the marketplace.The Philippine Competition Act was passed in 2015 after being stuck in Congress for 24 years. The Act is expected to improve consumer protection and help accelerate investment and job creation in the country, consistent with the goal of the national government in fostering an inclusive form of economic growth.
Enforcement of this law would help ensure that markets are open and free, challenging anti-competitive business practices, while maintaining an economic environment where businesses could compete based on the quality of their work.
A competitive market means a market with multiple buyers and multiple sellers, which has the effect of driving market prices lower and offering consumers more choices. For some economists, a "truly competitive market" encourages efficiency and innovation, forcing businesses to excel.
In 2014, a drastic increase in the price of garlic led to then President Benigno S. Aquino III conducting an investigation, which resulted in the discovery of a cartel controlling garlic imports. This led to Senator Paolo Benigno "Bam" Aquino IV authoring the 2014 Philippine Competition Act. This became the first instance wherein the Philippines gained a law specifically on competition.
Importance of Competition
The official website of the Philippine Competition Commission cites the following reasons on why they consider market competition to be important:- Competition leads to both economic growth and reduced poverty. It helps markets work better, fosters innovation, and protects investors and consumers. It will help to encourage wider domestic and foreign direct investments.
- Competition provides an improved enabling environment for small and medium enterprises that are critical to more inclusive economic growth and development in the country.
- Consumers win because free and fair competition leads to more choices, lower prices, and higher quality of goods.
The official website of the Philippine Competition Commission states that a stable, fair playing field is expected to result in greater interest among foreign investors, which in turn would lead to an expansion of the market, and opening global opportunities for companies in the Philippines, big or small.
According to Howard Ellis, an anti-trust lawyer based in the United States, economics is inherently individualistic, and without the individual's ability to choose freely economics cannot exist. He says that by principle, a monopoly limits the free choice of an individual in the market by controlling both the price and the scarcity of a product. He says that this inability to choose creates an economic environment that is unsuitable for practicing the economic optimum, which describes the best application of limited resources to unlimited wants of consumers. A factor in economic stagnation is brought about by this lack of the pursuit of the optimum.
Commission members
The Philippine Competition Commission, being an attached agency to the Office of the President, is headed by a chairperson and four Commissioners. The chairperson and the Commissioners make up the decision-making panel of the commission, and they work together in deciding on the different market competition issues that are under the jurisdiction of the PCC. In accordance with the Philippine Competition Act, they shall be appointed by the President, and have the rank equivalent of cabinet secretary and undersecretary, respectively. The primary requirement for their appointment would be being distinguished professionally in public, civic or academic service in the fields of economics, law, finance, commerce or engineering. Provided, That at least one commissioner shall be a member of the Philippine Bar with at least ten years of experience in the active practice of law, and at least one shall be an economist.According to the PCA, the chairperson and the Commissioners are to serve for 7 years without reappointment, and shall enjoy security of tenure. Of the first set of appointees, the chairperson and two Commissioners shall hold officer for a term of seven years, and the other two Commissioners shall serve a term of five years.
Appointed by former President Benigno Aquino III, Arsenio Balisacan served as the first chairperson of the Philippine Competition Commission. After having left his position as the Economic Planning Secretary and Director-General of the National Economic and Development Authority, he took his oath of office on January 27, 2016. Appointed PCC Commissioners Stella Quimbo, Johannes Bernabe, Elcid Butuyan and Menardo Guevarra also took part in the said oathtaking ceremony. In accordance with the PCA, Balisacan, as chair, would have served a seven-year term without reappointment. Quimbo and Bernabe will have a term of seven years, while Butuyan and Guevarra will have a term of five years.
Among the pioneer chairman and commissioners, Guevarra, Butuyan, Quimbo and Balisacan did not finish their set term. Guevarra vacated his position after being appointed as Senior Deputy Executive Secretary under the Office of the President on June 30, 2016, and was replaced by Amabelle Asuncion. Butuyan left the commission in July 2017 and was replaced by Macario De Claro Jr. Quimbo vacated her seat after she got elected to the House of Representatives in the 2019 general election and was replaced by Emerson Aquende.
Upon De Claro and Asuncion's end of term, President Rodrigo Roa Duterte appointed lawyers Marah Victoria S. Querol and Michael B. Peloton. Before her appointment to the PCC, Querol served as Senior Deputy Executive Secretary in the Duterte administration. With an economics degree and a Master of Business Administration, Querol joined the PCC backed with business, economics, and law. On the other hand, a Davaoeño lawyer, Peloton has been appointed to various government positions during the Duterte administration, notably the Commission on Elections, Philippine Reclamation Authority, and the Insurance Commission.
On June 30, 2022, Balisacan was appointed by President Bongbong Marcos to be the head of the National Economic and Development Authority thus vacating his position as chairman of the commission. As the only remaining pioneer and most senior commissioner, Bernabe thus became the officer-in-charge of the commission from June 30, 2022, until President Marcos appointed former Commission on Audit Chairperson, Ateneo Law alumnus, and Philippine Bar topnotcher Michael G. Aguinaldo as chair in January 2025.
Alongside Aguinaldo, President Marcos also appointed Atty. Lolibeth Ramit-Medrano, former Director of the Bureau of Patents at the Intellectual Property Office and a two-time Undersecretary at the Office of the President, as a member of Commission. Aguinaldo and Medrano joins Commissioners Querol and Peloton.
On February 10, 2023, President Marcos appointed Atty. Ferdinand M. Negre as Commissioner. Negre, former dean of the Manuel L. Quezon University School of Law, faculty member of the Ateneo Law School, and the 2014 Philippine Bar examiner in Mercantile Law, joins as the last member of the five-member commission.