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“We are very much enraged! The Duterte government has been consistently violating children’s rights from poverty, neglect of social services, ‘Oplan Tokhang’ to incarceration of children in conflict with the law and now they are militarizing schools and teaching children and youth to be blind followers.”

By JOHN AARON MARK MACARAEG
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – Advocates voiced out their opposition to bills they deemed as violating children’s rights.

Salinlahi Alliance for Children’s Concerns maintained that the proposed lowering of the minimum age of criminal responsibility (MACR) and the mandatory Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) for senior high school violate children’s rights and would put children in further danger.

In a press conference in Quezon City, May 28, Eule Rico Bonganay, Salinlahi Alliance for Chidlren’s Concerns secretary general said, “We are very much enraged! The Duterte government has been consistently violating children’s rights from poverty, neglect of social services, ‘Oplan Tokhang’ to incarceration of children in conflict with the law and now they are militarizing schools and teaching children and youth to be blind followers.”

The lowering of MACR from 15 years old to 12 has been approved by the House of Representatives on third on final reading. The House also approved on third and final reading the bill making ROTC mandatory in senior high school.

‘Not nationalism but blind obedience’

The mandatory ROTC for the Grades 11 and 12 or the House Bill 8961 states that it is aimed to instill patriotism, love of country, moral and spiritual virtues, and respect for human rights and adherence to the Constitution. Rights groups disagree.

Bonganay said the mandatory ROTC promotes blind obedience.

For Clarice Palce, an 18-year old student from Polytechnic University of the Philippines, ROTC will only pave way for the military forces to infiltrate schools and will result in abuses.

The group pointed out there were murder cases linked to the ROTC such as the death of Mark Welson Chua, a University of Santo Tomas student who died in 2001 due to hazing, and Willy Amihoy, a graduating ROTC cadet at Iloilo State College in Fisheries, who was killed inside the comfort room allegedly by his own corps commander in March this year.

Palce added that military presence in schools will violate academic freedom and other democratic rights of the youth.

Meanwhile, Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Arlene Brosas questioned why the legislators are fast tracking the lowering of MACR while there is an already existing law that concerns the children in conflict with the law, the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act.

Brosas said the law should be implemented, particularly those provisions dealing with rehabilitation of children in conflict with the law (CICL).She lamented that the facilities for CICL are like prisons not fit for children.

The proposed bill, she said, would not make things better for CICL.

The groups held a protest action in front of the gate of the Senate to oppose the “anti-children” bills.

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By MARYA SALAMAT
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – A few days before Marklen Maojo Maga’s scheduled judgement hearing, rights defenders, youth activists, relatives and fellow unionists held an action May 28 at the gates of the Department of Justice. They called for the junking of false charges against the imprisoned trade union activist Maoj Maga, and for freedom of other imprisoned unionists in the country. Maga is set to face judgment on false charges of illegal possession of firearms on June 3, 2019.

The KMU, the Ibon International and other groups urged civil society organizations around the world to release statements and other manifestations of support towards freeing Maoj, and the political prisoners in countries where workers and peoples are asserting their rights and sovereignty. They urged the public to participate in actions to counter the trend of shrinking democratic spaces.

In other countries, supporters also conducted coordinated picket protests and sending of letters of appeal to the Justice department calling for Maga’s freedom.

The International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines asked Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra to take action to withdraw the trumped-up charges against union organizer Maga.

“We consider the detention of Mr Maga to be unlawful,” said the coalition in the letter.

Maga is an organizer of the Kilusang Mayo Uno Labor Center. He was forcibly taken by a group of men while playing basketball near his home on February 22 last year. His “arrest” only became known to his family and fellow unionist the following days. The details of his “arrest” went like this: He was accosted on a basketball court by at least a dozen men, blindfolded and forced into a vehicle without being told why or where he was being taken. At the police headquarters, he was subjected to hours of interrogation and not given the chance to contact his lawyers and family.

The International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) said the arresting officers added to the outrage with the “absurd charge of murder in far-away Mindanao,” plus the police planted a .45 caliber pistol on Maga. Now, ICHRP is appealing to the Justice department on behalf of Maga who, they say, has been put through misery in several congested prisons as well as a quarantine-isolation cell when he has not committed any crime.

Rights groups see his case as typical of the detention of 550 other political prisoners in the Philippines. In the letter to Justice Secretary, rights groups also called for the release of all detained trade unionists in the Philippines and all 550 political prisoners held in jails across the country.

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