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Filipino activists slam mandatory military training for students

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Students from the Central Mindanao University attend a military training session in this undated photo: (Photo: Central Mindanao University)

Youth activists in the Philippines have criticized the government for pushing a bill to reintroduce mandatory military training for university students, purportedly to boost the country’s war readiness. 

The call for shelving the plan became sharper this week after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. insisted the Senate, the upper house of the parliament, “prioritize” the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) Act.

Senate Majority Leader Francis Tolentino said in a statement on Sept. 30 that Marcos approved the bill and moved it from Tier 1 to Tier 2 during a recent meeting, making it “a top priority,” the state-run Philippine News Agency reported.

Critics dismissed the US$1 billion plan as unnecessary and unjustified in a country where the education budget and quality of education have been dropping consistently.

Young political activist and lawyer Renee Co, in an Oct. 2 statement, said the push for the bill comes after the government imposed a 14.4 billion pesos (US$255 million) budget cut on its universities and colleges.

“This will further burden students, faculty, and administrators who already have fewer classrooms than needed,” Co said.

According to Co’s group, Kabataan Partylist, the 61.2 billion pesos (US$1 billion budget) allocated to implement the training initially can add another 24,480 classrooms to improve the quality of education.

Critics point to Filipino students’ poor creative thinking skills. A creative thinking assessment conducted by the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2022 placed 15-year-old Filipino students in the bottom four among 64 countries, The Philstar reported.

Co said the government’s move is deplorable as it is trying to re-introduce a program that “left students abused and killed in the past.”

The mandatory military training program for university students was abolished in 2002 after cadet Mark Welson Chua was killed, reportedly by his senior officers in 2001.

Chua, a student of the Catholic-run University of Santo Tomas (UST) in the capital, Manila, was killed after he exposed the corruption in the program at their university.

The program was also blamed for other irregularities and malpractices, such as physical abuse and hazing among university fraternity members.

Progressive student activist John Lazaro told UCA News that the killing of a member in hazing by 10 members of a fraternity in the UST and their conviction to lengthy prison terms showed the evils in the system.

Lazaro told UCA News on Oct. 3 that pushing to reintroduce the program amounts to strengthening “the violent culture of hazing” in the country.

Hazing is a common term for initiation rites involving forceful and humiliating attempts on someone to join a group or fraternity.

Hazing has killed at least 17 students in the last ten years,  Senator Sherwin Gatchalian said in a statement on Oct. 1.

Those who support the program say it is necessary to instill nationalism, discipline, and leadership among students and use them as a reserve force during various national crises and disasters, such as typhoons.

According to the official data, on average 20 typhoons hit the Philippines annually, killing thousands of people. 

However, observers say the Marcos government’s renewed push for the program stems from the Philippines’ ongoing maritime dispute with China and the need to strengthen military ties with the U.S.

Last year, a survey by the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines, the national body of Catholic education institutes, found that about 53 percent of the surveyed 20,461 senior high school and college students were against reintroducing mandatory military training for students.

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Picture of Written by <span>Ronald O. Reyes</span>
Written by Ronald O. Reyes
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