Cutting the shackles of state repression: Statement calling for the revival of the official student publication of PUP- Lopez
November 18, 2012
Press Statement
Reference Person: Jan Carlo Casupanan
Vice-chairperson for CALABARZON
CEGP Southern Tagalog
For more than four years, students of the Polytechnic
University of the Philippines (PUP) – Lopez in Quezon province have been
deprived of their right to expression and information. The struggle to
re-establish their official student publication continues after it was
forcibly closed due to military intervention.
Brief history of The Epitome
In September 2008, five students including the editor in chief of The
Epitome, official student publication of PUP-Lopez, were charged with
rebellion and harassed by the 76th Infantry Battalion of the Armed Force
of the Philippines (AFP).
The students were accused of being sympathizers of the New People’s
Army (NPA) simply because they criticized the education policies of then
president Gloria Arroyo. As the staffers articulated the legitimate
concerns of the students, military surveillance intensified inside the
school and soldiers started to camp out near the campus gate.
The military also conducted seminars in the school, identifying the
five students as NPA supporters and discouraging the students to join
the student publication and Quezon Youth Speak, a local youth
organization. The Epitome had to stop its operations due to red-tagging
activities and death threats that the students had been receiving.
In 2010, attempts to re-establish the student publication failed due
to the “chilling effect” of the military intervention, as students
feared for their lives in the simple act of joining a student
institution.
Campus militarization ensured closure
The College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP) – Southern
Tagalog chapter calls for the revival of the official student
publication of PUP-Lopez. We condemn the campus militarization in
previous years and the ongoing militarization in Quezon.
The very existence of a student publication attests that freedom of
expression is exercised inside an academic institution. However, instead
of encouraging intelligent debate, which is crucial in the emergence of
correct ideas, state forces tried to silence student journalists and
everyone else who only wanted to practice a constitutionally guaranteed
right.
Student journalists and youth leaders have the potential to empower
the consciousness of their fellowmen. Out of fear for this, the
government resorted to controlling student institutions via threats,
intimidation and fabricated charges under its framework for campus
militarization.
Unreported abuses: the need for a critical press
With more than two years in office of the Aquino government, human
rights group Karapatan has already recorded 114 cases of political
killings. This number is already a clear indication that the human
rights situation will worsen further and not otherwise.
According to the Save Bondoc Peninsula Movement, since July of this
year, 8 battalions of the AFP, are committing grave abuses of human
rights against peasants defending their right to genuine land reform in
South of Quezon province.
This intensive military occupation of Quezon’s Bondoc Peninsula
forced thousands of residents to evacuate their homes all for the greed
of local landlords and foreign corporations eyeing to plunder the area’s
natural resources. We cannot dismiss President Aquino’s accountability
to this matter as he is the commander-in-chief of the AFP.
It is therefore the role of student journalists to expose such
crucial issues that concern the youth and Filipino citizens that are not
usually reported by the corporate mainstream media. As pillars of the
alternative press, student publications become a necessary part of the
people’s struggle for progress.
This condition of violence and unrest further justifies the need for
our right to freedom of expression to be exercised. But how then can
this be achieved when a school’s publication is non-existent, when basic
rights are stripped from a generation?
Unmasking the veil of “yellow democracy”
The administration of President Noynoy Aquino only adopted similar
plans from the past Arroyo regime with the implementation of the Oplan
Bayanihan program under the dictates of the Central Intelligence Agency
of the United States.
With this in mind, the youth have only to expect more cases of human
rights violations among its ranks such as the killing of youth cultural
worker Lester Barrientos of the Southern Tagalog Cultural Network on
December 2010.
The Oplan Bayanihan further intensifies cases of campus
militarization throughout the country as what is happening in Samar
province where military intimidations and harassment are experienced by
members of The Pillar, official student publication of the University of
Eastern Philippines.
This is also the very reason why Reserved Officers Training Corps in
campuses are long sought to be disbanded. The military uses it as
intelligence networks to post to keep watch in the student activities,
and suppress any possible student’s participation who which to
participate in democratic movements.
Historically, the government has a penchant of employing the armed
forces in suppressing legal dissent. According to the reports of
Karapatan, there are 1,206 extra-judicial killings under Arroyo’s term
and most of these killings were perpetrated by military elements.
These cases, which include the killing of CEGP Mindanao Vice
President Beng Hernandez in 2002 and League of Filipino Students leader
in Bicol Ambo Guran in 2006, remain unresolved.
Who can forget the tragedy of the November 23, 2009 Ampatuan Massacre
as one of the bleakest history of press freedom in our country, with
the killing of 58 individuals including 32 media practitioners?
These proofs of human rights abuse from state forces show that this
is not only an isolated case for PUP-Lopez but rather a nationwide
systematic program to pacify critics of government policies.
Defending press freedom and people’s rights
The College Editor’s Guild of the Philippines- Southern Tagalog
therefore affirms its stand to uphold students’ freedom of expression
and right to organization. We may be threatened, but we are not
frightened to fight for our freedom.
We therefore encourage students to be part of our campaign to
re-establish the student publication of PUP-Lopez and, in the long-run,
to establish student publications in all schools.We urge school
administrations, if they are truly sincere in their motives to serve as
avenues to develop well-rounded individuals, to help the students in
attaining campus press freedom and protecting their democratic rights as
part of the Filipino youth struggling for genuine change.
As student journalists, we uphold not only our belief of press
freedom as a human right but also call to defend the people’s rights in
times when what we write, say and do ultimately need to serve as a
conscience for today’s social ills.
RE-ESTABLISH THE OFFICIAL STUDENT PUBLICATIONS OF PUP-LOPEZ!
UPHOLD CAMPUS PRESS FREEDOM! STOP CAMPUS MILITARIZATION!
END HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS! JUNK AQUINO’S OPLAN BAYANIHAN!
