MANILA, Philippines – After just one hearing, the bill seeking to make it easier for intersex people to change their gender marker and first name in civil registries hurdled the committee level in the House of Representatives on Wednesday, August 28.

The House committee on justice voted to approve House Bill (HB) No. 9555, or the Cagandahan bill, after a two-hour hearing. While it was subject to some wording amendments based on resource persons’ suggestions, the committee agreed on the measure’s basic principles.

The bill was named after Jeff Cagandahan, the Filipino who won a 2008 case where the Supreme Court allowed him to change his sex from “female” to “male,” and his first name from “Jennifer” to “Jeff” based on his intersexuality. 

Cagandahan, who was assigned female at birth, was born with congenital adrenal hyperplasia, a condition that affects the production of hormones in his body. As he grew older, he developed male characteristics, his ovaries shrank, and he had no breasts and no menstrual cycle. As Cagandahan felt physically and mentally that he was a man, he went through a tedious and costly court process to change his identifiers. (EXPLAINER: What is intersex?)

The Cagandahan bill, filed by Bataan 1st District Representative Geraldine Roman, seeks to make what Cagandahan achieved more accessible to intersex Filipinos. If passed into law, the measure would authorize city or municipal civil registrars and consul generals to change the sex and name of an intersex person without a court order.

The bill makes no mention of transgender individuals, who may also want to have their gender markers changed. Cagandahan strengthened his case with a psychiatrist’s testimony on his anatomy.

The author of the bill, transgender congresswoman Roman, said it was an example of a piece of legislation that is “responsive to the realities that we already live as a society,” considering intersexuality has been widely misunderstood. 

“Who knows, maybe in the future [our laws could cover] people like me, also,” she said.  

Support

Cagandahan himself was present in the Wednesday hearing. Emotionally beginning his manifestation, he recalled his legal victory, but lamented how the recourse was time-consuming and costly. He said that not everyone who needed the same correction in their civil registration entries could afford it.

“The fundamental human right of self-identity and legal recognition remains out of reach. [We] call for our reputable lawmakers to find the relevance of HB 9555 as a mark of accessible legal recourse for Filipinos to exercise their fundamental rights of self-identity and legal recognition,” said Cagandahan, who now leads organization Intersex Philippines.

The Philippine Association of Civil Registrars (PACR) expressed its support for the bill.

“The PACR interposes no objection to the proposed measure in order to provide equal access for intersex individuals for corresponding changes to be made in their certificate of live birth,” said Richard Lacerona, PACR executive vice president.

The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) also backs the bill, and suggested minor amendments such as in Section 11, which says that once an application for change of markers is granted, the old birth certificate should be sealed and kept confidential. 

PSA representative Betchewell Matienzo said in the hearing that once the new birth certificate is received, the old one should be canceled.

Pro-human rights

Meanwhile, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) and the University of the Philippines gender law and policy program noted how the bill advances intersex people’s rights.

CHR lawyer Christa Balonkita described the “best practices” of Argentina, Colombia, and Malta, which have measures that allow for the change of name and sex marker based on their chosen identities. These three countries, like the Philippines, are predominantly Catholic.

“House Bill 9555 is fully aligned with international human rights standards and best practices for promoting and protecting the rights of intersex persons,” said Balonkita.

Lawyer Aubrey Mejia of the UP gender law and policy program said the bill provides an “efficient and expeditious legal pathway for the recognition of an error that may not be predictable at birth.”

“To continue to subject such errors to the judicial process overburdens our courts with proceedings which are capable of being done administratively, and it also burdens intersex individuals with costs, both in actual monetary costs and costs of time, that may impair such individuals from beginning the process at all,” said Mejia.

Once the justice committee checks the committee report, it will be up for plenary discussions.

The Senate’s counterpart bill, authored by Senator Risa Hontiveros, remains pending at the committee level. – Rappler.com