President pulls no punches in fight over contraception

Meanwhile, boxing world champion Manny Pacquiao, a major star and an elected politician in his native Philippines, says he is the best example of why birth control should never be allowed.

After simmering for months, an acrimonious debate over government-funded access to contraceptives has entered the country's Congress.

The issue pits the powerful and conservative Catholic establishment against reformers who want more openness about birth control in the impoverished south-east Asian nation to slow population growth and help prevent disease.

A reproductive health bill introduced this week into the House of Representatives would require the government to provide information on family planning, make contraceptives available free of charge and introduce reproductive health and sexuality lessons in schools.

President Benigno Aquino III, still widely popular a year after a landslide election victory, has backed artificial birth control even if it means going against the dominant Catholic church. He has said he's ready to face the consequences and if necessary risk excommunication.

"I have been taught in school, which was a Catholic institution, that the final arbiter really is our conscience," Aquino told reporters yesterday.

"We are not looking for a fight with the church. "I have invited them many times so that we can have discussions, and we have focused on areas where we can agree."

Supporters believe the move would slow the Philippines' rapid population growth that contributes to the country's crushing poverty. About a third of the country's 94 million people live on $1 a day or less.

Independent opinion polls in recent years have shown strong public support for such legislation and Mr Aquino's supporters have a majority in Congress, but the bill is expected to draw a tough fight with debate likely to last until the end of the year and no guarantee of passage.

Church leaders have lashed out at Mr Aquino and mobilised a formidable public campaign to defeat the bill, with some bishops threatening to launch civil disobedience protests.

"Sex is not a game that should be taught to children along with the use of condoms supposedly to avoid disease," Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Rosales told a crowd of 40,000 assembled in the capital two months ago in one of the biggest such rallies.

Pacquiao - a member of the country's House of Representatives - has come out in opposition. Pacquiao has said he would never have been born if his parents used birth control.

"God said go forth and multiply. He did not say go and have just one or two children," Pacquiao said after meeting with the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines.