Philippine Collegian Tomo 100 December Issue

EDITORS' NOTE

PHILIPPINE COLLEGIAN

editor-in-chief daniel sebastianne daiz associate editor keian florino managing editor gretle c. mago business manager samantha del castillo features editor polynne dira layout editor venus janelle samonte guest editors lucky dela rosa kim yutuc

contributing members frenzel julianne cleofe andrea medina arthur david san juan adam torres ysabel vidor

probationary members news micah formoso john florentino perez johnson santos features patrick kyle adeva dan basquiñas guillana david sean ingalla luis lagman ryan maltezo mary june ricaña kultura dean gabriel amarillas karen buena john michael silerio illustration justin lawrenz delas armas maya caitlin erfe star laguio maria laya elisha montemayor rona pizarro layout angelyn castillo angeli mari rodenas isaiah verdejo photography luisa elago kathleen isaac ar jay revilla administrative aide gina bakukanag amelyn daga ma. trinidad gabales circulation manager gary gabales circulation staff pablito jaena address Student Union Building, UP Diliman, Quezon City, Philippines website www.phkule.org email phkule.upd@up.edu.ph telephone +(632) 8981-8500 loc. 4522 member College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP) UP Systemwide Alliance of Student Publications and Writers’ Organizations (UP Solidaridad)

» Sa ika-sandaang taon ng kritikal na pamamahayag, makikipagtuos ang Kulê sa mga isinuka na ng taumbayan ngunit muling nanunumbalik, sa mga pinunong dahas ang tugon sa ating mga hinaing, at sa mga maykapangyarihang nandurusta sa taumbayan para sa sariling ganansya. Ang taong ito ay magmamarka ng pagbabago sa midyum ng pahayagan, upang masigurong lapat ang bawat isyu sa pangangailangan ng mambabasang malaman at maunawaan ang mga pangyayari, at ang pangmatagalan nitong implikasyon sa mas malawak na iskema ng mga bagay.

Illustration by Maria Laya

Beyond the UP Presidential selection, the UP community will still have to deal with the equally vital selection of the chancellors of Diliman, Los Baños, Manila, and Visayas next year.

02 Sino at Ano ang Kulê 04

EDITORIAL Beyond the Boardroom 07

NEWS Frenzel Julianne P. Cleofe Calls for Transparency, Accountability Resurface After BOR Selects Prexy Sans Sectors’ Backing 10

FEATURES S ean Marcus L. Ingalla No Place of Peace 14

FEATURES Mary June A. Ricaña The Maharlika Deceit 17

OPINION Frenzel Julianne P. Cleofe The Movement Post-Joma Sison 20

PHOTOGRAPHY Ar Jay Revilla, Luisa Elago, and Kathleen Isaac Tahak ng Komunidad sa Pagbalik ng Parol 22

FEATURES Josemari Luis C. Lagman Crushed Under the Cargo 27 KULT Karen Buena Ang Hinaing sa Himig 30

NEWS Ysabel Vidor When BPO Workers Only Live to Work 34

NEWS Johnson L. Santos, Jr. The Year 2022 in Review 37

OPINION Daniel Sebastianne Daiz Pseudo-permanence

EDITORIAL

Beyond the Boardroom

While the tragedy of our campaign to select a better UP president remains fresh, this is also the time to assess our past efforts, reckon with our mishaps, and move forward.

Only rage and revulsion must meet the questionable selection of Angelo Jimenez as the next UP president. Only militancy and the strongest assertion of our demands must meet his administration. There will be no time for dithering once Jimenez assumes the presidency in February 2023.

Until the end, it seemed like the presidential selection would go our way. After all, only chants in support of UP Diliman Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo reverberated through Quezon Hall the entire December 9. But our demands fell on deaf ears as politics, not merit; brotherhood, not the community; secrecy, not transparency prevailed again in the boardroom. Jimenez’s selection was only made possible by an unrepresentative UP Board of Regents (BOR).

According to the student regent, Nemenzo was unable to proceed to the succeeding rounds of voting. In

the end, our sectoral regents had no choice but to vote between Jimenez and former UP Los Baños (UPLB) Chancellor Fernando Sanchez Jr. as they were the remaining nominees in the subsequent balloting. Our representatives in the board were left with no choice but to pick between the candidates who were not even supported–and even condemned–by the UP community.

Sanchez, for instance, has been vehemently opposed by the students due to his anti-student policies during his time as UPLB chancellor. He presided over the failed implementation of the SAIS and notoriously rejected hundreds of readmission applications. Jimenez had likewise shown a similar distaste for students during his time as a Malacañang regent. In 2020, the former regent consistently voted against mass promotion and academic easing policies in the BOR. He was also part of the BOR that approved an honorary UP degree for

Our demands fell on deaf ears as politics, not merit; brotherhood, not the community; secrecy, not transparency prevailed again in the boardroom.

Rodrigo Duterte, only to have the plan aborted after massive condemnation.

Jimenez’s position against the UP-DND Accord–that it has been rendered null by the UPDILG Accord–must be sufficient justification to continue our strong condemnation of his selection. As a former student leader in the late 1980s, Jimenez should have been at the forefront of understanding how students’ democratic and human rights can easily be snatched when state forces are allowed to encroach on the university.

Jimenez’s aversion to the UP-DND Accord is an invitation writ large for the military to permeate the campus. Be it in the guise of “gardening” or any other supposed innocent activities, the university’s lack of protection from military incursions remains a threat. Jimenez risks UP’s academic freedom. At a time when UP should be at the forefront of opposing the Marcos regime, the incoming president’s disregard for the protection offered by the UP-DND Accord is appalling and contravenes his duty to uphold UP’s autonomy.

A Jimenez administration not only risks our safety and security but also imperils communities and workers’ rights. His disdain for regularizing all UP workers because there are “certain jobs that are not permanent” is abominable. The university’s need for job orders or “emergency workers” is itself a manifestation of poor planning and lack of foresight of the university’s needs. If it will be business as usual, we can expect the number of contractual employees, lecturers, and job orders to continue rising under his presidency.

Stakeholders of the UP community stood firm at Quezon Hall to assert their rights and demand accountability from the UP Board of Regents (BOR) during the UP president selection, November 9. /Luisa Elago (2022)

Ultimately, it will be the communities who will be at the losing end of a Jimenez presidency in the long run. Mere hours after his selection, the president-select faced an emotional Ate Bebang, a longtime Pook Malinis community leader, who asked Jimenez about his stance on the urban poor residents on campus. Far from reassuring, Jimenez’s answer resorted to legalese, saying UP lands must be used by the university alone–strikingly similar to the current UP administration’s construction compulsion at the expense of displacing communities.

The danger of an unabated and unrelenting Jimenez administration cannot be overstated. Even during Jimenez’s first dialogue, organized by the student regent, with the UP community earlier, he remained noncommittal to our nonnegotiables: the institutionalization of the UPDND Accord, support for student formations, strengthened workers’ rights, and humane treatment of our communities. Should Jimenez remain obstinate in his contentious stances, he is effectively abandoning his duty as the leader of the national university.

With our indignation still vigorous, it becomes essential to consolidate our ranks and unite anew to assert our well-meaning demands and campaigns for the upcoming administration. A constant watching eye and our collective militancy will be our only defense against a

regressive UP presidency–and we can only do such if we have the numbers. As we mobilize ourselves, it is equally important to incessantly broaden our ranks by tirelessly organizing across students, workers, faculty, and communities.

We shall surround Quezon Hall with vigilance—from Jimenez’s appointments of university officials, voting record in the BOR, and even his own fraternity. We shall guard the gates and barricade Quezon Hall to extract commitment and assurance that our demands will be met.

While the tragedy of our campaign to select a better UP president remains fresh, this is also the time to assess our past efforts, reckon with our mishaps, and move forward. Beyond the UP Presidential selection, the UP community will still have to deal with the equally vital selection of the chancellors of Diliman, Los Baños, Manila, and Visayas next year.

In a few months, Jimenez will have the power to drastically change the national university in one stroke of a pen. But with our strong assertion and collective efforts, we can wield our power to decide for ourselves the path that UP will take–notwithstanding the regents or what their backers dictate. After all, neither the regents nor Jimenez’s cohorts can prevent our uproars from being heeded beyond his office and beyond the boardroom.

«

With our indignation still vigorous, it becomes essential to consolidate our ranks and unite anew to assert our wellmeaning demands and campaigns to the upcoming administration.

Frenzel Julianne P. Cleofe

Calls for Transparency, Accountability Resurface After BOR Selects Prexy Sans Sectors’ Backing

» As positions of chancellorship in Diliman, Manila, Los Baños, and Visayas are up for grabs this year, stakes are higher if issues on transparency in the board remain unresolved.

Inside the towering and grandiose façade of Quezon Hall, every discussion and decision of the 11-member UP Board of Regents (BOR) determines the fate of the entire UP System. A renewed call for transparency in the decision-making inside the board has surfaced following the selection of Angelo Jimenez to become the next UP president amid the lack of support from the sectors.

Every six years, the BOR, as the highest decision-making body of the university, is mandated by law to select the next UP president “following a process of democratic consultation with the university community.”

But details on the board’s internal process and the justification of the regents behind their votes remain hidden from the public, casting doubts on the transparency and democracy of the selection process

for university officials, especially since four UP chancellor positions are up for grabs in 2023.

Not a Single Word from Above

On December 9, the special board meeting to select the 22nd UP president started at 10 a.m. At the foot of Quezon Hall, different sectors called on the board to heed the demands of the UP community. However, not one board member had gone down to acknowledge the community’s demands. After hours of deliberation, Student Regent Siegfred Severino announced that the board selected Jimenez to be the next UP president.

Prior to the announcement of Jimenez’s selection, not a single piece of information from the boardroom was made known, except for the general flow in which the meeting has proceeded.

Prospero De Vera, CHED and BOR chairperson, faces the UP community after the UP presidential selection on December 9. /Luisa Elago (2022)

Page design by Venus Samonte

As Prospero De Vera, chairperson of the Commission on Higher Education and the BOR, was about to leave Quezon Hall, he was asked about the justifications behind the selection of Jimenez as the UP president. “Siguro mas maganda ang kanyang sagot, siguro mas maganda ang kanyang plataporma,” he said.

De Vera’s tight-lipped and obscure reply only aggravated the doubts surrounding the board’s true intentions in the selection process.

Different members of the UP community have been pressing the BOR to listen to their calls as only UP Diliman Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo–and no other presidential nominee–has received public endorsements across various UP sectors. Yet, in the end, Jimenez emerged as the victor.

Following the BOR’s move to select Jimenez, it seemed that the selection process had not considered what the UP community had demanded. But the issue of seemingly arbitrary and opaque selection of UP officials is not new to the BOR.

In 2019, the board chose Joel TanTorres, who was neither a UP faculty nor a doctorate degree holder, to become the dean of the College of Business Administration. Tan-Torres’s selection sparked protests from the university community, especially the faculty who saw the decision as an affront to the value of democratic governance in UP.

“[Magiging] malaking pinsala ito sa unibersidad [kung mangyayari ‘yun sa chancellor selection],” said Florian Alburo, an economics professor who protested the anomalous dean selection process, in a 2019 interview with the Collegian, referring to the possibility of the anomalous process to reoccur in the 2020 UPD chancellor selection. “Para sa akin, prinsipyo yan … This is a university—academic freedom ang importante rito.”

Tan-Torres was not granted a teaching position by his colleagues in CBA, preventing him from fully exercising his duties as the BOR-selected dean. The appointment of a person as a dean does not come with a faculty position as it is the senior faculty of the college who decide whether to recommend tenure to an applicant.

Deans administer only one college, while the UP president leads the entire UP System. If an anomaly in the deanship has already drawn flak, then there is much more at stake on matters of the UP presidency. Conversely, an anomaly in the UP presidency selection will also cast doubt on the appointment of other UP officials.

The Rise and Dangers of Executive Sessions

Because the portion in which the BOR appoints officials is done under executive sessions, there are no records of the discussions that transpire inside the boardroom. Even the UP Gazette, the official journal of BOR meetings, simply indicates at the start of each appointment that “[at] this point, the Board went into executive session,” and proceeds to list the appointments that the board has made. Even the proponent of the executive session is not disclosed.

The board might go under executive session when taking up the appointments of top university officials, a practice that has taken place as far back as the 1970s under the term of former UP President Salvador P. Lopez. All UP president selections since 1975 were done under executive sessions.

The manner of selection, however, has differed through time. In 1981, the presidential selection was done by consensus. Succeeding selections were done by secret ballot and majority vote. In some cases, the BOR chair would be excluded in the voting process, except to break a tie.

Details on the selection process are hidden as the meetings are primarily done behind closed doors. Even the balloting process itself is arbitrary. In selecting chancellors and deans, regents are generally asked to explain their vote. In a presidential selection, however, only a paper ballot is given, and the regents can simply tick the name of their favored candidate. In the process, the public cannot know who the members of the BOR voted for.

“Kailangan magkaroon ng pag-upo ang BOR para magkaroon ng guidelines [na] magbibigay ng mas malaking importansya sa transparency. Hindi yung normal na process na ginagawa ang pagpili under executive sessions,” said Ramon Guillermo, former faculty regent and a professor at the UP Center for International Studies.

There has been an increase in the executive sessions invoked in the appointment of university officials in recent years. President Danilo Concepcion’s predecessors only had an annual average of two executive sessions. However, under his term, the annual average has risen to six executive sessions–including dean appointments–which heightened calls for transparency and accountability, even from inside the BOR.

Guillermo added that the BOR needs to be transparent to the community, especially in terms of choosing highranking officials in the university. Instead of the current off-the-record procedure, he suggests that the selection should allow regents to openly state who they are voting for, give justification for their nominee of choice, and disclose such information to the public.

Currently, it is only through the sectoral regents’ report that the public is informed about the discussions in the BOR meetings.

“Kinakailangan natin sa ngayon na sikapin na iparating sa loob ng BOR

Prior to the announcement of Jimenez’s selection, not a single piece of information from the boardroom was made known, except for the general flow in which the meeting has proceeded.

ang panawagan ng mga sektor. That’s why we have statements and manifestations, we express the positions of our sectors in the BOR and try to have them recorded as much as possible,” Guillermo said. “But, it’s always an uphill battle.”

Challenges On Structure and Democracy

The BOR is composed of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) chairperson, the UP president, the chairperson of the Committee on Higher, Technical, and Vocational Education of the Senate, the chairperson of the Committee on Higher and Technical Education of the House of Representatives, the president of the UP Alumni Association, three Malacañang appointees, the faculty regent, the student regent, and the staff regent.

Ideally, each member of the board should carry out the interests and benefits of the institution or sector they represent. However, in some instances, even in such significant positions as the UP presidency, personal affiliations come into play.

“The board is secretive because there are individual players in there that have interests that we know of because we’ve unpacked them or we don’t know of because they’re keeping their cards very close to their hearts,” former Student Regent Renee Co told the Collegian

Sen. Francis Escudero is affiliated with Jimenez as both are part of the Alpha Phi Beta fraternity. Concepcion and Alumni Regent Reynaldo Laserna are members of the Upsilon Sigma Phi fraternity, while Regent Gladys Tiongco is part of Sigma Delta Phi, a sorority with close ties to Upsilon. Rep. Mark Go is part of the House leadership of Speaker Martin Romualdez, an Upsilonian. Regents Raul Pagdanganan and Dr. Gregorio Pastorfide are colleagues at Cardinal Santos Medical Center. And the board

chair, De Vera, openly supported President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Vice President Sara Duterte during the campaign.

“[The BOR sees] the UP presidency as a means to ensure that whatever interests they have are upheld. And they’re not all the time relevant to the direct constituent base of UP or the general public. What I see as undemocratic is how the assigned representatives act. Ine-ensure dapat natin yung mga ina-appoint nating mga tao ay credible and they are committed to their role,” said Co.

The board, being composed mainly of entrepreneurs and politicians except for the three sectoral regents, has an obvious flaw regarding representation. After all, the university is mandated by law to promote democratic governance “based on collegiality, representation, accountability, transparency and active participation of its constituents.”

“Bilang student regent, I have been a recipient of messages saying na [I should take down my social media posts] because it violates the privileged communication [in executive sessions],” said Co. She added that the sectoral regents are only doing their duty to report back to their constituent base, and such bans violate the transparency that the sectors are entitled to.

This 2023, as four positions of chancellorship–Diliman, Manila, Los Baños, Visayas–are up for grabs, stakes are higher if issues on transparency remain unresolved.

“Skewing the composition to favor the number of sectoral regents would greatly benefit the board. Kailangan [din] mag-end yung practice ng pag-enter into executive sessions. Lahat ng decisions natin should be accessible to the public whenever they want,” Co said. “Let the minutes speak for themselves.”

Sean Marcus L. Ingalla

No Place of Peace

»

Conflict-affected communities in Northern Mindanao face heightened rights violations as peace negotiations remain suspended.

First, you will hear the whirring of planes. Then comes the booming sound of bombs, sometimes followed by subsequent rounds of guns being fired. This is the signal to evacuate unless the targeted area of the airstrike is too near. The only thing to do, then, is to run as the ground shakes.

More than 85,000 individuals have been displaced for more than five months due to armed conflict in Mindanao as of October 2022. More communities are in danger of being displaced as conditions for lasting peace remain far from being met.

Aldeem Yañez devoted himself to that very struggle for peace. In his youth, he served as the president of the Youth of Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI) and composed songs of freedom.

Dionito Cabillas, a parish priest of the IFI who worked with Yañez at the National Cathedral, recounted the long hours that Yañez would spend in communities organizing and

conducting discussions that tackle the struggles of workers and peasants, and engaging in interfaith activities.

“Ang kanyang nasa isip ay paglingkuran ang organisasyon ng kabataan ng IFI na naka-ugnay palagi sa kung ano iyong hinahangad ng mamamayan pagdating doon sa usapin ng human rights, justice and peace,” Cabillas told the Collegian

But Yañez’s commitment and efforts toward lasting peace were deemed seditious by the state. Only two months before former President Rodrigo Duterte’s term ended, Yañez was arrested for allegedly owning a gun, explosives, and so-called subversive documents. His illegal arrest came just a year after trumped-up charges against him and 16 other activists over links to communists were junked by a court.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s pledge to continue in the footsteps of his predecessor, and his rejection

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s

pledge to continue in the footsteps of his predecessor, and his rejection of peace agreements dispel the people’s hopes of moving back to their communities.

of peace agreements dispel the people’s hopes of moving back to their communities. Families will continue to have to leave their homes and suffer abuses as long as the state refuses to stride the path of just and lasting peace.

Caught in the Crossfire

In the face of constant military bombardment, civilians residing in conflict-affected areas are often the ones at the receiving end of rights violations. Living in fear due to the uncertainty over their security, they are forced to evacuate to safer places.

Yañez’s stint as a development worker in Misamis Oriental, Cagayan de Oro, and Bukidnon led him to witness some of the troubles that befall these communities: Plagued by the perennial problem of being deprived of their right to own the lands they till, those caught in the war zones in Northern Mindanao suffer from displacement.

More than 5,800 individuals in Northern Mindanao have left their communities due to armed conflict as of October 2022, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ Displacement reported. In October 2021, 2,430 people from Sitio Gabunan, Bukidnon had to evacuate to evade the armed encounter that ensued between the Philippine Army and the New People’s Army (NPA).

The Rural Missionaries of the Philippines, an organization that Yañez also worked with, shared that during instances of extreme turbulence, one of the sanctuaries that the communities turn to is the churches.

Cabillas shared that before the localized counterinsurgency, churches and religious formations freely

worked across different sectors to implement development projects without fear of reprisal. Through IFI’s Visayas Mindanao Regional Office for Development, organizers lived with, and empowered peasants to launch their initiatives on sustainable agriculture, collective discussions, and income-generating programs. “Malakas ang taong simbahan noon sa Cagayan de Oro bago ang redtagging,” he said.

When the likes of Yañez, then, become targets of the state, members of the communities they have been with experience a chilling effect.

“Pag na-associate ka kay Aldeem na pinaratangang komunista, yung kaassociate niya, kung di man komunista, ay sympathizer ng komunista. Yung ganoong pag-akusa ay [nagdudulot na] mawalan ka ng kalayaan sa movement kasi restricted [ang] iyong paggalaw,” Cabillas said.

Anyone linked to the person tagged as a communist is driven through arduous and dehumanizing steps just to clear their name. Instead of being presumed innocent before any verdict is given, the opposite is true in the communities. Already judged guilty, residents must justify their innocence to the barangay officials by naming people they think are connected to rebels.

In 2021 alone, at least 488 combat operations by the Armed Forces of the Philippines against the NPA have been conducted in 69 provinces, resulting in the forced evacuation of around 16,000 individuals and the demise of many civilians. They were later labeled either NPA combatants or sympathizers.

Just a few months after Yañez’s arrest, Marcos assumed the presidency

Peace negotiations primarily aim to restore the democratic rights and dignity of all sectors.

NARRATIVES

with much of Northern Mindanao still reeling from the previous administration’s oppressive policies.

“We see no difference insofar as the Marcos government is concerned. Their repeated pronouncements that they will conduct localized peace talks show the policy direction of the present government,” said Ephraim Cortez, a public interest lawyer and president of the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers.

No Room For Negotiations

The state’s refusal to negotiate with the revolutionaries through the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) signifies the government’s lack of willingness to peacefully resolve the longstanding conflict. In its pivot to localized peace talks, the suffering faced by civilians is only magnified.

Duterte, at the start of his term, postured as a peace advocate by welcoming the conduct of national peace negotiations. Along with the dialogues is the continuation of agreements between the two parties that will ensure the observance of human rights as these talks proceed.

One of the agreements is the Comprehensive Agreement on the Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL) which would ensure that both sides behave in compliance with international humanitarian law and laws governing conflicts. Emphasizing the protection of civilians, CARHRIHL is crucial in probing cases of rights violations among communities, prohibiting war practices that endanger civilians, and asserting victims’ right to seek indemnification.

But when Duterte terminated the negotiations in 2017, the government stopped respecting any agreement, including CARHRIHL. Instead, he embarked on a tactic that utilized a localized, rather than a national,

approach to stifling insurgency through Executive Order 70. The order led to the formation of the infamous National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), a body committed to targeting individuals and civil groups who the state sees as enemies.

“The scrapping of the agreements relative to the peace negotiation will expose civilians, as it already exposed them, to the violations of their rights under the constitution, the rights defined and protected under existing laws and international agreements on human rights and international humanitarian law,” Cortez said.

Much of NTF-ELCAC’s P19.1 billion funds in 2021 were for its Barangay Development Program (BDP) which supposedly propels the development of areas “cleared” from insurgents. With many reports of irregularities in the agency’s use of funds, human rights group Karapatan criticized BDP as a program that only provides incentives for officials to commit human rights violations to achieve nefarious ends.

Since the beginning of Duterte’s term, the regions that received the largest share of the BDP funds—Davao, Caraga, Northern Mindanao, Western Visayas, and SOCCSKSARGEN—were the ones

Illustration by Rona Pizarro

with the most cases of extrajudicial killings, tortures, and political arrests associated to counterinsurgency.

Inheriting these conditions, Marcos, from his campaign until now, expressed no intent in heeding the call for the resumption of peace talks between the government and the NDFP. Marcos pledges to continue the localized peace talks, rejecting the nationwide and systemic scale of the people’s socioeconomic plight, which brought on the conflict in the first place.

During the first 100 days of Marcos’s term, there were already 13 documented killings by state troops

nationwide, with most cases guised as fake encounters with the NPA. It can only be expected from here on that there will be an exacerbation of rights abuse through forcible surrender, mass arrests, bombings, strafing, shelling, and killings.

Reverberating Call for Lasting Peace

Echoing the same call that Yañez has untiringly forwarded, Cortez believes that the government must commit itself to the resumption of peace talks. To make this possible, he said that the first step must be to reinstate and respect prior agreements, such as CARHRIHL, to make sure that everyone’s human rights will not be trampled upon.

Peace talks reject the currently implemented localized model that is predicated upon the practice of leveraging the self-interests of groups and authorities to discourage them from working together with progressive organizations and people like Yañez. Instead, peace negotiations primarily aim to restore the democratic rights and dignity of all sectors. For those in Northern Mindanao, this means the redistribution of land from landlords to those who actually till the fields. This also means that the very conditions that led to the unjust persecution of Yañez and other volunteers will also come to an end, subsequently preventing the mounting oppression faced by the civilians they have worked with.

The Free Aldeem Yañez Now Campaign, in a statement, called for the release of Yañez and for the government to drop the charges against him. “We reiterate and stand by the truth that Aldeem Yañez is an unarmed civilian vilified by the state who tries to justify their illegal arrest and continuing harassment in many forms,” the statement released on April 14, 2022 read.

In the course of struggling for lasting peace, Cabillas stressed that the different sectors’ demands for development must be met. “Hanggang di malutas ang problema sa lupa, magpapatuloy ang rebolusyon sa Pilipinas,” he said. Devoid of abuses and violence, peace will only emerge if everyone’s right to life and dignity are also upheld.

In the face of constant military bombardment, civilians residing in conflict-affected areas are often the ones at the receiving end of rights violations.

In shifting the grim picture of war-torn communities with civilians whimpering in anguish amid extreme animosity, the government must open its doors to negotiate terms with revolutionaries whose basis for fighting is rooted in destitute conditions that the state itself caused and has maintained. Yanez’s prayer for peace shall be transformed into reality so long as the struggle for justice is carried on.

Mary June A. Ricaña

The Maharlika Deceit

» The Maharlika Investment Fund is a policy out of thin air. The country’s economic and political situation does not warrant its passage or its creation.

The government has its priorities all over the place. At a time of high inflation rate, declining wages, and worsening quality of life, its best bet is to place the country’s money in a high-risk investment fund, rigged with economically and politically unsound elements.

On November 28, the Maharlika Investments Fund (MIF) Act was filed by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s cousin, son, and several other lawmakers. The entire process from proposal to passage in the House of Representatives only took 18 days.

It was initially a bill that sought to create a sovereign wealth fund (SWF) for the Philippines aimed at economic development. SWFs are state-owned funds typically financed by a surplus in revenue or reserve, and are invested in real and financial assets.

The bill initially proposed pooling funds from the Social Security System (SSS), Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), Landbank of the Philippines (LBP), and the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) for its capital. But with the public apprehension on the use of pension funds, a newer version of the bill excluded SSS and GSIS as capital sources.

The bill also had other changes, such as the addition of penal provisions where stockholders who violate the guidelines of the fund will be jailed for one to five years, and the shift of focus to an investment rather than a wealth fund, among others.

But no amount of revisions nor additional provisions can redeem a faulty bill that runs contrary to the needs of Filipinos today. With the ails and wails of the people, even just the proposal of the MIF is misplaced and unscientific.

Social Services Sweetener

The proponents of the bill claim the MIF will be used to promote social development. A quarter of the fund’s net profit will be given as subsidies to families below the poverty threshold, beginning with those earning P12,030 per month for a family of five. The remainder of the profit would be allotted for “social welfare programs and projects, excluding infrastructure projects.”

But for Mimi Doringo, secretary general of the urban poor group Kadamay, the provision is nothing but a deception for the easy passage of the MIF bill. “Kung gusto talagang magbigay ng social services sa mga

maralitang katulad namin at sa lahat ng mga nangangailangan, dapat inuuna ang batas na makakatulong sa atin,” she said.

It is not uncommon for Congress to add social welfare provisions to questionable laws. For example, the TRAIN Law in 2018 included an Unconditional Cash Transfer Program, which provides cash grants to poor families affected by the law. The law, however, increased the excise tax on petroleum products, among others, which heavily increased the prices of basic commodities as well.

The MIF bill does not say outright whether the 25 percent allotted for poverty subsidies would be given on top of the already existing social assistance programs or if it would merely fund the current programs. If the allocation would just fund existing programs, then there would be no net addition in the amount of assistance beneficiaries will receive.

If the government is really keen on helping the poor, it would not look into an economically unsound investment fund to do it. After all, it is the most vulnerable sectors that bear the most weight of bad economic decisions.

Amid the 8 percent inflation rate, the highest it has been in 14 years, the urban poor sector–with little prospects

No to Maharlika Fund!

of a decent paying job–is subjected to increasing prices, yet the government has not offered any help. The labor agenda of the Marcos administration remains missing despite the paltry P570 minimum wage in Metro Manila, which is just half of the amount needed to support a family of five members in 2022, according to economic think tank IBON Foundation.

Sonny Africa, IBON executive director, echoed Doringo’s sentiments, calling the provision a “sweetener.” For him, the formulation of the provision is vague and noncommittal.

“Di pa nga sumabay ang 2023 budget sa pagtaas ng bilihin. Ibig sabihin, ipit talaga ang budget ng gobyerno,” Africa told the Collegian IBON finds the 2023 national budget rigged with misprioritization despite the economic crisis. Crucial service-oriented institutions, such as the Department of Social

Welfare and Development that offer much needed aid for the poor, have experienced funding cuts.

“Bakit ka maglalagay ng pondo sa investment fund na unang una, hindi mo ginagastos sa pangangailangan ngayon at pangalawa, hindi garantisado ang kita?” Africa said.

In Bad Faith

A state investment fund involves magnitudes of risk and thus, requires magnitudes of trust from its stakeholders—two things that Filipinos cannot afford.

At first glance, the idea to pool billions of funds to invest in business ventures for economic development seems like a good idea. But, here is the pièce de résistance: The Philippines has no excess funds, only a deficit. As of December 2022, the general government debt of the country stood

at P13.64 trillion. To compensate for the lack of excess funds, the MIF proposes taking its initial investments from government banks such as the LBP, DBP, and BSP.

In the first iteration of the bill, it was proposed that the initial investments would take P125 billion from GSIS, P50 billion each from SSS and LBP, and P25 billion each from DBP and the annual budget. In the version approved by the House of Representatives, the initial investment would be composed of P50 billion from LBP, P25 billion from DBP, and 100 percent of the BSP’s declared dividends for the first and second fiscal year of the bill’s implementation.

LBP and DBP are government-owned and controlled corporations (GOCC). This means they receive funds from the government and in return are mandated to serve Filipinos. The LBP is mandated to provide financial assistance and

Different groups gathered at the House of Representatives to oppose the Maharlika Investment Fund. /ARPAK - Artista ng Rebolusyong Pangkultura (2022)

support services to the farmers and fisherfolk, while the DBP serves the micro, small, and medium enterprises in the country.

“They’re already doing development work and yet, we’re trying to get funds from them and to put on this investment fund, and we’re not even sure that the new fund that we’re putting it into would actually work well,” said Enrico Patiga Villanueva, a senior lecturer of economics at UP Los Baños.

The independence of the BSP also comes into question as not so long ago, the same family who proposed the MIF bankrupted the Central Bank of the Philippines. The bank had reported a P300-billion worth of losses by the end of Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s term in 1986, due mainly to the foreign debt he acquired to finance crony businesses.

For Africa, the chances for a BSP bankruptcy are slim as the 1987 Constitution has safeguards in place. However, the broad list of the MIF’s possible investments might be steered in favor of the administration’s allies. Under the current language of the MIF bill, virtually any investment approved by the board can be allowed.

With the bill spearheaded by the Marcos family in Congress and masterminded by the president himself, the real objective behind the MIF is dubious.

“Sino-sino ba naman ang mga nagsulong? Wala naman silang kredibilidad para humawak ng malalaking pondo,” said Doringo. “Yung pamilyang Marcos, may utang pa nga silang P203 billion, hindi pa nababayaran.”

In the bill approved by the House Committee on Banks and Financial Intermediaries, the president was to be designated the chair of the Maharlika Investment Corporation (MIC). This was later revised as questions on the safeguards of the bill were raised. In the current legislation, the secretary of

finance–a president’s alter ego–would sit as the chairperson of the MIC.

But despite the revision, the governance of the MIC is still disreputable as only five out of the 15 board members are independent directors. The rest would still be under the influence of the chairperson, who is appointed by the president.

The apprehension regarding MIC’s leadership comes as no surprise as our neighboring countries’ state investment funds have fallen into corruption schemes by their managing bodies.

The 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), for example, has been subjected to embezzlement by then Prime Minister Najib Razak. It was found in 2015 that Razak had stolen approximately USD 700 million from 1MDB. In 2020, the company acquired an outstanding debt of USD 7.8 billion.

If the MIF were to follow the same path as the 1MDB, it would place the GOCCs’ already suffering beneficiary farmers, fisherfolk, and MSMEs at more risk.

Issues on the bill’s safeguards coupled with its economic unsoundness are nothing but colossal caution signs to rethink its passage.

Tax the Maharlikas

After two and a half years of lockdown that crippled the economy and amid soaring inflation, now is not the time for the MIF.

Even if the MIF were to churn out profit, it does not already guarantee development for the country. “Kahit i-assume na natin na kumita ng 7 to 8 percent ang MIF, kung ang naging kabayaran ay hindi pinondohan ang ayuda, hindi pinondohan ang sistema ng edukasyon, hindi tinulungan ang mga magsasaka, mangingisda, at mga MSMEs, hindi tama na sabihin na pakinabang yan para sa publiko,” said Africa.

If the Philippines is really in dire need of funds, then risking the already limited funds of the public is not the way. A guaranteed way to earn money for the government would be to venture into wealth taxes, according to IBON.

By taxing the 2,945 billionaires in the country, the government could earn P469 billion, which is more than four times the proposed capital sources from the national banks for the MIF. The estimated total revenue for the wealth tax comes from a one percent tax on wealth over P1 billion, two percent on wealth over P2 billion, and three percent on wealth over P3 billion.

“Bakit hindi yun ang i-pursue ng gobyerno kung sinsero siya na gusto niya ng kita? Bakit pa apektado ang ibang mga existing funds ng gobyerno?” said Africa.

The MIF is a bill out of thin air. The country’s economic situation does not warrant its passage or its creation. As it is transmitted to the Senate for its concurrence, the loud voices of the house minority and the public majority must be heard: Focus on the existing economic problems at hand and do away with investments that place public funds in grave danger.

A state investment fund involves magnitudes of risk and thus, requires magnitudes of trust from its stakeholders—two things that Filipinos cannot afford.

Frenzel Julianne P. Cleofe

The Movement Post-Joma Sison

» The deaths of fascists are the death of their tyrannic governance, but the deaths of revolutionaries are the birth of a powerful movement.

Only a few people on their deathbeds could wholeheartedly assert that they have lived a full life. Jose Maria Sison is definitely one of them. To dedicate one’s life to national and social liberation is a noble feat, but to inspire millions to serve the people through one’s enduring wisdom and unwavering determination is an eternal fulfillment.

However massive his contributions are, the struggle for social change does not end with him, unlike what his adversaries have claimed. There is a movement much larger and greater than him that will continue to serve the people.

The state’s military and foot soldiers, like the former spokesperson of the infamous counterinsurgency task force, unsurprisingly, were euphoric about Sison’s death on December 16. Some pointed out an irony: The clan who spurred Sison’s radical ideology is also the one who will see

its demise. One went so far as to say that the movement has now become obsolete and irrelevant with the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founder’s passing.

Those who spout such claims have never understood society. They believe we run explicitly on ideology and lofty ideals alone, but that goes against the core of Sison’s ideological bases: ideas, principles, and theories come from what is material. Our idea of liberation comes not from imagination but from our daily experience of exploitation, and it is the very fuel of existing uprisings and mass movements.

Claims that the struggle for freedom and democracy will end due to the death of one man also come from those who write such statements precisely to protect those we are rising in arms against. Sison believed the Philippine society is one where two forces contradict: the few elites

COLUMN

However massive his contributions are, the struggle for social change does not end with him, unlike what his adversaries have claimed. There is a movement much larger and greater than him that will continue to serve the people.

Page design by Angelyn Castillo

Our idea of liberation comes not from imagination but from our daily experience of exploitation, and it is the very fuel of existing uprisings and mass movements.

and the deprived many. Those at the top live off the suffering of others, and so for our afflictions to end, the elites have to be stripped of their wealth and properties. But this is not easy, as the elites have soldiers, institutions, spokespersons, and writers, too, who will quell any hint of desire for freedom.

Sison knew changing society is not an intellectual exercise. In 1964, he co-founded Kabataang Makabayan, a youth organization forwarding national democracy. In 1968, he chaired the CPP whose objective is to wage a revolution that will take back lands from landlords to distribute them to peasants, unshackle the country from foreign dependence, and dismantle the corrupt and violent bureaucracy. These radical ideas have been spat on and vilified mainly by those who have dominated society’s laws and lands for so long.

Sison’s teachings became the life and blood of grassroots organizations aiming to empower the marginalized. Because the people’s tangible experiences of systemic malaises have always existed and continue to trickle in the narrowest crevices of society, a great number of people have been aroused and mobilized to take on the challenge for social liberation.

Under Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s regime, Sison was detained for nine years until his release in 1986. While visiting the Netherlands two years after his emancipation, the government under Corazon Aquino canceled his passport, and charges were filed against him due to the Philippine Anti-Subversion Law. Since then, he and Julie de Lima, his wife, had been living in exile. However the distance, they did not stop being one with the struggle for independence

and democracy. And even in his final moments, Sison believed in the revolution.

“Some fifteen or so minutes before Joma took his last breath, he was still talking about ensuring the revolution would win and advance to socialism,” said de Lima in a short note to the CPP’s 54th anniversary on December 26.

Mobilizations against oppressive state laws will persist, calls for justice for workers will be louder, and the resistance to tyrannical governance will be stronger. Sison is but one person; thousands of young people will have big shoes to fill, but the fight will continue.

The national democratic movement is not dead. As long as there are people who unjustly exercise their authority, the subdued will always retaliate. To forcibly silence the mass movement is to grasp at straws. It is futile to stifle equity because people who have been made aware of the rights they deserve will not yield to injustice again. A person, once radicalized, will continue to advocate for a democratic nation and society. This is the future that Sison has paved the way for, and it is up to us to heed this call or to perpetually grapple with oppression.

Sison founded the Communist Party of the Philippines in 1968. He developed and applied Marxism-Leninism-Maoism to the country’s conditions, eventually constructing a critique of Philippine society and building the party’s philosophy of national democracy with a socialist perspective.

Illustration by Maria Laya

Jose Maria Sison 1939-2022

Tahak ng Komunidad sa Pagbalik ng Parol

»

Nostalgic para sa mga estudyante at liderestudyante ng School of Economics ang paggawa ng parol. Hango ang parol sa isang butanding na sumisimbolo sa pagbangon sa kabila ng mga pagsubok dala ng pandemya.

Bagaman kulang sa tao, nagtutulungan ang mga estudyante at kawani mula sa janitorial services ng Kolehiyo ng Arte at Literatura. Inaasahan nilang makapaghatid ng kagalakan sa komunidad sa pamamagitan ng kanilang talento sa sining.

Binabalutan ni Kiara, kinatawan ng Konseho ng Kolehiyo ng Komunikasyong Pangmadla, ang bahagi ng kanilang parol na may temang “Town Crier,” sa tapat ng Plaridel Hall. Simbolo ito sa patuloy na paghahatid ng balita sa kabila ng disimpormasyon.

Kinukumpuni ng isang kawani mula sa Kolehiyo ng Agham ang katawan ng kanilang parol na hango sa isang balyena. Pinatampok ng kolehiyo ang usaping kalikasan at lumalalang polusyon sa kanilang parol. Nasungkit ng kolehiyo ang ikalawang gantimpala sa mga pinakamahusay na parol.

Ar Jay Revilla, Luisa Elago, at Kathleen Isaac

Matapos maudlot ng dalawang taon ang Lantern Parade, muling nagsama-sama ang mga estudyante, guro, at kawani ng unibersidad para sa paggawa at parada ng mga parol sa temang “Bagong Tahak, Bagong Galak.”

Ipinarada ng All UP Academic Employees Union sa kahabaan ng Academic Oval ang kanilang parol na “Golden Era” sibuyas at ang mga napapanahong panawagan. Kasama sa parada si Domingo Padua, Presidente ng Samahan ng mga Nagkakaisang mga Guards sa UP Diliman, na nakibahagi sa mga panawagang bitbit ng unyon.

Inangkin ng College of Arts and Letters ang pinakamataas na gantimpala sa Parada ng mga Parol ngayong taon. Sinimbulo ng kanilang parol ang bisikleta bilang bilang sumisikat na alternatibong paraan ng transportasyon.

Ang “Sierra Madre” na gawa ng isang pangkat ng mag-aaral sa College of Fine Arts ang nag-uwi ng kampeonato sa kanilang kategorya. Ayon sa alamat ng bulubundukin, pinoprotektahan ni Sierra Madre ang mga anak niyang sina Tagalo at Iloco mula kay Bugsong Hangin.

Ipinarada ng isang pangkat mula sa College of Fine Arts ang kanilang parol na hango sa konsepto ng community pantry. Ginugunita ng kanilang parol ang pagkakaisa ng iba’t ibang miyembro ng komunidad noong pandemya upang itaguyod ang pantry para sa mga nangangailangan.

Pinaingay ng mga tambol at lira ng bandang Juan Nolasco Tribe ang buong gabi sa kahabaan ng Academic Oval kasabay ng pagparada ng mga parol.

Disenyo ng pahina nina Andrea Medina at Venus Samonte

Josemari Luis C . Lagman

Crushed Under the Cargo

» Each day, Manila Harbour Centre’s laborers work for 12 hours, scrape by with paltry pay, and risk losing a limb. After years of maltreatment, workers decided to camp outside the harbor.

The image of progress, innovation, and development one might derive from the sight of the harbor contrasts to the daily experience of stevedores, machine operators, winchmen, and other dockmen working in the port.

Photos by Ar Jay Revilla (2022)

As you approach the port’s entrance, your eyes would first land on the glossy, probably recently lacquered metal nameplate of the Manila Harbour Centre (MHC). Against the blistering Manila heat, its glimmer casts a sort of spotlight on the scene to its left: hulking freighters lining up along the wharf, portside cranes hoisting container vans from ship to shore, and a brigade of semi-trucks carrying batches of steel beams safeguarded by sheets of blue drop cloth.

Further towards the left, however, you would see tatters of that familiar blue covering now tied in a slipshod manner to an erect piece of bamboo–a temporary dwelling for those whom the harbor has turned its back against. A large, orangecolored piece of hemp fabric is also fastened to a tree with rope, and on it are painted the words “Ibalik ang 370 manggagawang tinanggal!”

The company of disgruntled workers forced into substandard living

conditions just beside the harbor entrance casts a striking contrast to the image of progress, innovation, and development that one might derive from the sight of MHC. Yet, this distinction epitomizes a classic story that MHC’s dockworkers have lived for more than 10 years now–some for even more than 20. It is a story of fractured limbs, illegal contracting, and chronic hunger.

Nerves of Steel

Pinned between a busy highway and the country’s premier cargo handling center, the workers’ hovel barely allows Ronaldo Acevedo Torres, a stevedore of the MHC for more than four years, any reprieve from Manila’s hustle and bustle. On the monoblock table where their rations are cached, he dices a block of liver with a box cutter.

Torres points at the dried fish, bread, and other viands that concerned individuals have pitched in, following the buzz their strike had generated

on social media. These are a marked departure from the instant noodles and traditional rice and salt pairings that they have grown accustomed to eating for survival.

Amid the burdens they face, they have chosen to maintain their camp to protest their day-to-day drudgery in the harbor.

Torres leaves his home, located in a small Tondo colony a bridge away from their camp, and reports to the docks ahead of the rising of the sun. The hazardous nature of his work is magnified by the absence of safety training and equipment in the harbor.

Torres and his fellow stevedores lug around container vans that weigh a ton using personal protective equipment (PPE) that they bought with their own wages.

Yet, uniformed or not, the perils of the harbor spare none. As another laborer said, “Ang isang paa mo, nasa hukay na. Kapag nagkamali ka, ‘yung kalahati mo, laglag sa hukay.”

Page design by Venus Samonte

NARRATIVES

Francisco Manaog, 48, president of the Unyon ng mga Manggagawa sa Harbour Centre (UMHC), has seen more than 15 of his co-workers die from fatal injuries. “Kapag operator ka kasi, yung boom ng barko ang aakyatan mo. May mga kasamahan kaming operator na nadulas at laglag, kaya nagkadurogdurog ang katawan. May mga estibador pa kami diyan na nabali ang buto’t paa, nagulungan ng mga bakal,” said Manaog.

Yet, he has also seen the MHC management respond with measures just as pitiless as the conditions that necessitate them. “Mayroon naman silang shuttle. Ang problema, kapag inihatid ka na sa ospital, wala na silang itutulong pa. Kapag hinatid ka doon, iiwanan ka na nila kahit hindi ka pa inaasikaso ng doktor.”

When the time comes for management to shoulder medical expenses, or to proffer the deceased worker’s wages to the beneficiaries of his insurance policy, a constant back and forth ensues between the company’s recruitment agencies and MHC. “Magtuturuan silang mga agency at management. Itong si [agency] ‘pag sinagot mo, si Harbour naman. ‘Pag si Harbour naman, sasabihing sa agency kayo,” Manaog narrates. Yet the law dictates that both the agency and the principal company are liable for the payment of disability benefits.

This acute lack of accountability and transparency takes hold outside of health benefits and medical expenses. The labyrinthine bureaucracy endemic to MHC complements the greed of its superintendents, and their failure to render fair pay and security of tenure for MHC’s dockmen.

On a typical working day, Torres and his fellow longshoremen work for about 12 hours. This is four hours more than the eight-hour standard maximum per day. Because their work is on-call, Torres says that whether or not an employee gets to work for the day depends on whether or not their supervisor blurts out their number during the morning

Photos by Ar Jay Revilla (2022)

roll call. Workers are fortunate if they can work three to four times a week.

Manaog says that their daily salary barely grazes the P570 minimum wage rate in Metro Manila. Depending on the functions of their job, their wages range from P550 to P680. Even though their work demands that they risk their life, they receive a pittance in return, and at most times even get a hold of their pay late. “Ang pasahod nila ay kung kailan lang nila gusto magpasahod–yun lang ang kailangang sundin.”

The UMHC president also said that their employers produce no pay slip upon transmission of their wages. Because of this, workers are in the dark about the justifications behind their pay deductions–two of which are a 10 percent interest their agencies cut

upon transmission of their wages, and a reduction that supposedly serves as their regular contribution to the Social Security System (SSS), PhilHealth, and Pag-ibig. It was found later on, however, that the workers’ contractors had not been remitting the employees’ aforementioned contributions.

Such is only a smidgeon of the illicit practices underlying the legal battle that has been raging between the workers of MHC and their employers for six years now. The three manpower agencies that supply hundreds of personnel to MHC have remained unchanged, and with each passing year, a new exposé–the gravest of which was the illegal removal of 370 MHC workers in January 2020–reinforces the workers’ decision to camp out and hold their ground until their calls are heard.

A Wearisome Battle

Manaog keenly traces the hunger his family suffers every day, as well as his coworkers’ decision to pull their children out of schooling, to the mass lay-off that took place in 2020.

The history underlying the illegal dismissal extends as far back as March 2, 2017, when workers of the MHC protested the unlawful hiring practices perpetrated by manning agency Grasials Port Services, also known as Gerolyn Stevedoring, which had been found guilty of sequestering employees’ payments to the SSS since 2009. The agency was engaged in a service agreement with MHC.

Following a concerted onslaught of charges pressed by the workers against the agency and Harbour Centre Port Terminal, Inc. (HCPTI), DOLE sanctioned a cease and desist order against Grasials. The order was circulated on August 24, 2017, following findings that the agency was not registered under DOLE. On top of the order, DOLE ruled that the 378 workers of the harbor be regularized and compensated P99.89 million in money claims.

But instead of recognizing the decision, the MHC opted to appeal on September

1, 2017, which the Court of Appeals immediately shot down. Enraged at MHC’s obstinate attitude, from then until late 2019, the harbor workers launched a salvo of pickets to assert their rights as regular workers. To stop their onward march in its tracks, the HCPTI junked their service agreement with Grasials, and leveraged this to lay off a total of 370 dockworkers on January 13, 2020–the onset of the pandemic.

The Supreme Court sided with the workers on June 28, 2021, however, trashing MHC’s Motion for Reconsideration and ordering them to reinstall all 370 workers into their payroll. On September 15, 2021, the SC ruled with finality in their decision to have MHC regularize their workers.

Amid all of the victories the union bagged in the legal arena, the MHC remains unfazed. They have not issued any statements regarding the strides the union has made towards their regularization, much less granted any of the requests that they had lobbied for more than four years now.

The situation in Manila Harbour Centre mirrors that of the national labor force. There are 20 million contractual workers in the country, and in the transportation and storage industry group where the

employees of MHC fall under, 35,929 out of 164,726 are non-regular.

“Wala kaming natatanggap sa kanila, kaya umaklas kami. Tinanggal pa kami nang iligal, tapos binalewala kami, kaya nagkampuhan kami,” says Torres, after serving all of his confreres the stewed liver he cooked for lunch.

Though the workers’ pleas have only grown louder over the past six years, the

Page design by Venus Samonte

It was found later on that the workers’ contractors had not been remitting the employees’ contributions to social and health insurance.

MHC management continues to sneer at their calls. They continue to deafen themselves with the blare of ship horns, the growl of truck engines, and the cries of bone-weary workers that all lend themselves to their harbor’s unshakable image of profit and development.

Yet, their employers’ greed only grants credibility to the workers’ calls–calls that honor the deaths of their peers and aim to extract accountability from the company behind them.

Calls Louder Than the Striking of Metal

“Ang pangunahin talaga naming kahingian ay kilalanin ang unyon namin, kasi iyon lang ang poprotekta sa mga karapatan namin,” says Manaog. The right to self-organization and collective bargaining is inherent to all workers under the law, but bigname corporate bodies such as the MHC continue to impinge on this, as is seen in the example of workers’ unions in Laguna and Mactan.

In addition, UMHC’s call to be recognized as regular workers resounds the nationwide campaign to end contractualization instead of simply regulating it, like what DOLE’s toothless Department Order No. 174 does.

As inflation reaches an all-time high since 2008, UMHC also perceives the urgency of instituting a national

minimum wage. The transition to this system has been a point of contention in the legislative sphere. On September 16, 2022, the National Minimum Wage Bill was filed to abolish wage rationalization, which companies exploit to minimize salaries and enliven business process outsourcing practices.

The calls that MHC’s dockmen carry are a protest against the unforgiving reality the harbor has heaved them into. Yet, a vital component of this reality that is not as often spoken of is the generational nature of their job. “Tinuruan ako ng tiyuhin ko. Tinuruan niya akong magwinchman,” a worker who had been in the stevedoring line states while recounting his days as an operator in his old firm.

Irrespective of whatever legal victories the past six years have bestowed on them, and whatever they will get from the many more years to come, MHC’s criminal form of governance will continue to haunt the workers of MHC even after death–once their sons find no viable recourse other than to submit themselves to a job in the harbor as well.

It is for the solemn wish that their children may never have to bet their lives on a couple of tons of imported steel that the workers of UMHC dare to put up a rudimentary hutch next to the country’s hotspot for bulk and breakbulk operations–and wage a tireless battle even with the odds weighing against them.

Photos by Ar Jay Revilla (2022)

Irrespective of whatever legal victories the past six years have bestowed on them, MHC’s criminal form of governance will continue to haunt the workers of MHC even after death.

Karen Buena

Ang Hinaing sa Himig

» Sapagkat kahit magsiawit ng daing at sakit, bingi pa rin ang mundong pinatahimik.

Ang Pagsalakay na Sinapit

Ang pasko ay sumapit Marahang nanginig ang himig Salamangkerong awit Nagbibigay-dilim at lamig

Nanalangin ako sa sanggol Mula sa dantaong panahon Hiniling ang kanyang pagtanggol Sa ektaryang lupang inararo

Sa pagpatak ng pasko May tatlong haring nagsidalaw Alay sambat palakol Pagsalakay ay inihandog

‘Pagkat kahit magsikap ay hindi pa rin Makakamtan, kasaganaang minithi Kahit magsiawit ng daing at sakit Bingi pa rin ang mundong pinatahimik

Gintong aral ay sinunod ko naman din Nagbungkal nagtanim nagtiis sa gilid Ngunit dugo pa rin ang nagsilbing dilig Binhing nagkulay pasko sa hatinggabi

Disenyo ng pahina ni Angelyn Castillo

Dibuho ni Maria Laya

Sa May Kalsada ang Aking Bati

Sa may kalsada ang aking bati Sa imbis na paskong mal’walhati’y Usok at busina ang naghari

Mga nag-iindakang bumbilya ay Ilaw trapikong nakahanay

Pula dilaw luntiang nagsasayaw Dulo’y hindi ko na matanaw

Ang sanhi po ng pagparito’y Mag-uuwi po ng aguinaldo Kukurampot ma’y tinrabaho Hatid pa ri’y ngiti kay bunso

Ngunit perwisyo’t gastos lamang Ang inihahain ng gabi Tatlong oras sa kalayaang Ang pag-usad ay pagkunwari

Dibuho ni Star Laguio

Kumakalamkalam

Kumukutikutitap, bumubusibusilak Ganyan ang galaw ng mga matang Kikindat-kindat, kukurap-kurap Sa sikmurang kumakalamkalam

Kumukutikutitap, bumubusibusilak Sa langhap ng nanunuksong handaan Tumitiboktibok, sumisinoksinok Pati na ang tuyong lalamunan

Iba’t iba ang putahe Manok keso at spaghetti Inihain sa Malate Ngunit ‘di pa rin mahingi

Kumukutikutitap, bumubusibusilak Ang puso sana ng manalalakbay Ngunit heto pa rin ako, nag-iikot-ikot Tirang pagkain ay pinapanday

Disenyo ng pahina ni Angelyn Castillo

Ysabel Vidor

When BPO Workers Only Live to Work

» Despite its enormous contribution to the economy, poor working conditions plague the BPO industry. A BPO workers’ group is pushing for a law to ensure their protection.

A group of business process outsourcing (BPO) workers is pushing for a Magna Carta Law to ensure decent wages, safer workplaces and working conditions, and freedom of association for the industry’s employees. If passed, the Magna Carta for BPO employees could be the most significant reform of the country’s largest and fastest-growing sector.

The shortcomings of existing labor policies have paved the way for BPO workers to experience inhumane working conditions. Stella Maragagay, a BPO worker of seven years, lamented that most employees are forced to report to the office even when they are sick due to the critical attendance being mandated in their line of work.

“Kadalasan, naghihingalo at namumutla ka na sa pagod pero hindi ka pa rin talaga pauuwiin dahil babagsak daw ang workforce at malalagot sa mga kliyente,” Maragay said.

As the industry grows annually, posing a 10.5-percent revenue growth in 2022, the BPO Industry Employees’ Network (BIEN) believes that the industry’s workers must also be given their fair share in that growth.

“Kaya nabuo ang labor agenda na ito dahil sa mga demands ng BPO workers to push for fair wages and better working conditions. Dapat sa pag-unland ng industriya, umuunlad din ang buhay ng mga manggagawa,” said BIEN President Mylene Cabalona.

Grappling With Long Hours and Meager Pay

BPO employees usually receive a monthly salary of P12,000 to P18,000, a far cry from the P31,000 standard entry-level wage that various organizations, including the Outsourced Workers League, have proposed.

Manggagawang BPO, mag-unyon!

Amid the perils that come with being a BPO worker, employees collectively assert better work conditions through unionizing.

Meager pay is just one of the many problems that BPO workers experience. It is also commonplace in the industry to have long working hours. “Uwing-uwi ka na at pipindutin mo na yung end shift mo pero biglang pagtingin mo madadagdagan ka pa ng oras. ‘Pag naman iniwan mo, may nakalagay pa na kulang-kulang na oras. Job abandonment pa ibabato sa’yo dahil kailangan ka ng negosyo,” Maragay said.

Although BPO companies claim that they allow workers to decline overtime, this often comes at the cost of leave credits. When employees request a leave the next time, the company will disallow them due to their refusal to go overtime regardless if they have ample leave credits to utilize.

Workers are only allowed to work eight hours a day, according to the Department of Labor and Employment’s (DOLE) conditions of employment. Should overtime be necessary, additional compensation must be provided to them. Emergency overtime work is only required for extreme reasons such as when there is imminent danger to public safety. However, most employees have to go overtime to cover for the lost hours due to the absences of their workmates.

“Through the Magna Carta Law, we want to standardize the wage of BPO workers regardless kung saang location nila kasi companies try to take advantage of the regional wage [system],” Cabalona said.

The daily minimum wage in the Philippines varies per region with a rate of P570 in the National Capital Region (NCR) and about P300 in the other provinces, prompting some BPO companies to put up offices in regions with lower wage rates. In the proposed law, there will be mandatory hazard pay and subsidies for BPO workers during national emergencies.

The proposed measure does not only provide financial benefits as it also seeks to protect the health of employees through standardized healthcare coverage—an essential benefit considering the high-stress environment surrounding the BPO sector. Some employees also develop chronic illnesses because of the unhealthy lifestyle proliferating in the industry.

Dangers That Come With the Job

Yaz Asis, a 38-year-old BPO employee, has been working in the industry for eight years. They almost had a stroke because their work starts at different times every month. For a few months, Asis worked the morning shift, and they only got a single day off to adjust for the night shift.

The little time given to adjust their body clock compelled Asis to increase their caffeine intake as the work schedule of BPO employees is starkly far from the usual working hours. Some are required to work at night, but at the expense of messing up their body clock, making workers more likely to develop illnesses.

“Tumaas ang uric acid ko, to the point na nahihirapan na akong huminga, di na ako makalakad at muntik na akong atakihin sa puso,” Asis said. Illnesses force BPO workers like Asis to go on leave. While those are paid leaves, Asis had to render mandatory overtime as soon as they came back.

Even Maragay’s stomach has become too acidic to the point that even a sip of coffee will trigger severe abdominal pains. She admitted that coffee became the default—but unhealthy— mechanism to stay awake amid the long working hours.

“Hindi mo naman masisisi ang sarili mo. Hindi lang yun dahil sa choices mo. Wala ka rin namang magawa dahil at that point ang pag-inom ng kape yung nakikita mo na solusyon [para magising],” she lamented.

Page design by Isaiah Verdejo

Meager pay is just one of the many problems that BPO workers experience. It is also commonplace in the industry to have long working hours.

Despite having a medical clinic in their office, treatment is still elusive, according to Maragay. Their office clinic only has a single nurse and a doctor who is only available until 10 a.m. While health cards exist to alleviate the burden of paying medical bills, some choose not to utilize them fearing that they would have to take some time off, especially as absences are discouraged by the management.

The situation inside BPO offices worsened when employees returned to on-site work after COVID-19 cases decreased. The management became lax with health protocols which compromised their health even more. There are instances where even when one has a fever, the clinic forbids them to be sent home out of fear that the management will reprimand them. Even team leaders and operation managers refuse to report cases of COVID-19 to avoid absences and loss of working hours, according to Asis.

An unhealthy lifestyle is not the only concern of employees as the lack of sanitation has also posed risk to workers. For one, the sharing of headsets used to be the norm, and other equipment, such as the mouse and keyboard, are not sanitized after every shift.

“Hindi maiiwasan na kumain habang nagtatrabaho kaya syempre yung mga kamay nadudumihan tapos hahawak sa mouse at keyboard. Hindi na yan nalilinisan bago ipagamit sa ibang empleyado,” Asis said.

Amid the perils that come with being a BPO worker, employees collectively assert better work conditions through unionizing. But even organizing is vilified, if not prohibited in the industry.

“Talagang tinatanggal ang members and officers kapag may unyon sila. You must have enough strength to do bargains with the company

especially when our political climate discourages organizing,” Cabalona said.

When the Right to Unionize Is Infringed

Employees often fear joining unions as the management threatens them. Asis, while forming a BIEN chapter in their company, was constantly disrespected by the management and

their officemates. “Tinatawag na akong bida-bida at araw-araw pinapahiya ako sa hallways. Sinasabihan ako na sa labas na lang mag-rally at kung ano-ano pa,”Asis said.

Soon after, Asis was terminated after being accused of aux toggling, a jargon in the industry that means an agent is temporarily unable to receive a call.

floor, nanginginig na ako sa takot dahil alam ko wala naman akong atraso at pinagtutulungan lang ako,” Maragay said.

The Magna Carta for BPO workers, if passed, will ensure that workers can collectively bargain, self-organize, and form unions. The measure will also protect any form of retaliation that the company may inflict on the employees.

Under the 1987 Constitution, those employed in the public and private sectors have the right to form unions, associations, and societies. Union busting, which includes terminating union officers or threatening the existence of the union, is also prohibited.

While some BPO companies do not ban unions outrightly, some employees still endure threats from the management to prevent any form of organizing.

“Point is, whether you create a union or just a chapter, you will be threatened dahil ayaw ng pagbabago ng kumpanya. When they find out you are associated with BIEN, you will be intimidated,” Asis said.

In solidarity with workers, members of the BPO Industry Employees’ Network participated in the Bonifacio Day mobilization last November 2022.. / BIEN PILIPINAS (2022)

“Prior to the termination, I was warned by my operations manager, ‘wag mo sabihing hindi kita pinagsabihan.’ It’s as if they were intimidating me na itigil ko na ang pinaglalaban ko or else termination will be the result,” Asis said.

In Maragay’s early years in the industry, she felt that the management was harsh on

those who tried to unionize. She later learned that the company assigned personnel to pinpoint employees who tried forming unions. Employees caught unionizing were slapped with fabricated charges and complaints.

“Nagsisisi ako noon kasi nagpatalo ako sa kanila at umalis na lang ako. Pagtapak pa lang ng paa ko sa ground

Just recently, the president of the Unified Employees of Alorica Inc. was also charged with moonlighting or having a second job, simply because they were part of BIEN. Eventually, they were terminated because Alorica did not recognize the union. This, despite the union being recognized by DOLE.

“It’s demoralizing and it’s like torture for us, but we know it’s the government’s way to silent dissenters. Of course, nothing will silence us–all the more reason for us to unionize so we may push for the needs of the BPO workers,” said Cabalona. “Hindi raw kami marginalized pero hindi nila alam na patong-patong ang problema sa loob ng industriya. We need to protect our rights.”

The Year 2022 in Review

» 2022 is not a good year for Filipinos and the world to look back on. The year housed new local and international crises, continuing COVID, and new health and political problems.

The year 2022 was filled with controversies, here and abroad. A lot unfolded this closing year: from the 2022 national elections, continuing fight to end the COVID-19 pandemic, human rights violations, allegations of corruption, to a change of leadership in UP.

This year also marked the Marcoses’ return to Malacañang as Ferdinand

Marcos Jr. won the presidential election on May 9, over 36 years after his father was ousted by a popular revolt. His running mate, Sara Duterte, the daughter of Rodrigo Duterte, also won the vice presidency.

Within UP, the UP Board of Regents selected a new president that will determine the course of the university

for the next six years. In the international scene, skirmishes between countries reached a new juncture with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as tensions between the US and China over Taiwan.

In these times of crises, the Filipino people’s resistance has made it through the year and will welcome 2023 with renewed hope and a stronger resolve to the challenges that lie ahead.

Johnson Santos

Cover design by Andrea Medina

JANUARY

The world welcomed 2022 with a record-breaking 300 million positive cases of COVID-19 across the globe. While scaled-back in-person classes were allowed in low-risk areas, the National Capital Region tightened restrictions after cases of highlyinfectious Omicron variant spiked. In response, authorities strengthened the vaccination campaign, including allowing second booster doses for qualified populations.

MARCH

Then-President Rodrigo Duterte approved laws, one for the benefit of the people and the other for foreign interests. In March, he signed amendments to the Foreign Investments Act which allowed foreign companies to acquire more than 50 percent of vital service sectors such as telecommunications, railways, airports, and expressways.

31 million votes amid an election marred with irregularities and a campaign season notorious for lies and disinformation. His closest rival, former Vice President Leni Robredo, came second with 15 million votes.

Meanwhile, the National Telecommunications Commission distributed ABS-CBN’s analog frequencies, two years after it was shut down, to Manny Villar’s Advanced Media Broadcasting System, Apollo Quiboloy’s Sonshine Media Network International, and Aliw Broadcasting Corporation.

FEBRUARY

Russian President Vladimir Putin waged a full-scale war against Ukraine on February 24 that displaced eight million people, the biggest refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.

Duterte also signed Republic Act 11648 that raised the age of statutory rape to 16 years old from 12. In a statement, Malacañang said that the law aims to provide better safeguards to minors against rape, sexual exploitation, and abuse.

APRIL

Despite being referred to as “draconian” by local and international human rights groups, the AntiTerrorism Act of 2020 passed the final hurdle as the Supreme Court declared nearly all of its provisions to be constitutional. The high court heard nine oral arguments before it released its full decision on April 26.

Despite his 1997 tax violation conviction, Marcos was allowed to run by the Commission on Elections. Until today, his tax liabilities are unsettled. Meanwhile, only Sen. Risa Hontiveros was the lone opposition candidate to win in the Senatorial elections.

JUNE

Five members of the UP Diliman community were conferred the National Artist titles on June 10: Late professor emeritus Antonio Mabesa for theater, Gemino Abad for literature, Ricky Lee for film and broadcast arts, Fides Cuyugan-Asensio for music, and Agnes D. Locsin for dance. In October, Dulaang UP paid tribute to its founder Mabesa who passed away in 2019. UP now has 36 national artists.

JULY

In an hour-long televised message to the nation, Putin denied Ukraine’s right to statehood. Minutes after his speech, military troops on the Russian border invaded Ukraine. The conflict continues to this day as Ukraine is being supplied with military and financial aid by Western countries.

MAY

Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., son of the late dictator Marcos Sr., won the presidency after garnering

The World Health Organization officially declared the monkeypox virus outbreak an international concern on July 23 as daily confirmed cases outside Africa have reached more than 4,000.

Page design by Isaiah Verdejo

SUMATOTAL

The first positive case was a British national who exhibited symptoms in London after traveling from Nigeria. Monkeypox is an ongoing outbreak with 83,539 confirmed cases as of December 23.

AUGUST

Sugar Regulatory Commission Commissioner Hermenegildo Serafica resigned over the issue of the release of Sugar Order 4 that allowed the importation of 300,000 metric tons of sugar without authorization from the president. This was after the country suffered from a sugar crisis brought by supposedly low output. However, the United Sugar Producers Federation claims that the country’s sugar stocks were being hoarded.

in NCR. UP Diliman held its first inperson freshie welcome assembly and freshman tour since 2019.

Meanwhile, alternative media publications, such as Bulatlat, and other progressive groups’ websites were blocked under the directive of former national security adviser and AntiTerrorism Council member Hermogenes Esperon Jr. Bulatlat’s website has since been temporarily unblocked after paying a P100,000 bond.

Tensions between US and China boiled over after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, along with five other US members of Congress, visited Taiwan as part of her Asian tour. She is the first highranking US official to visit the island in 25 years. The visit was heavily contested by Beijing who said that the Americans are “playing with fire.”

SEPTEMBER

UP welcomed more students to its campuses for in-person classes and activities after two academic years of distance learning after the IATF eased several social gathering restrictions

Meanwhile, Filipinos commemorated the 50th anniversary of the declaration of Martial Law on September 21. Groups and advocates called on Filipinos to remember the atrocities committed by the Marcoses, and to resist the threats to the country’s democracy.

OCTOBER

Veteran commentator and broadcaster Percy Lapid was shot on his way home in Las Piñas on October 3. A certain Joel Escorial surrendered to the police two weeks after his murder and tagged three others who were allegedly involved in the killing: brothers Israel and Edmon Dimaculangan and an alias “Orly.” Bureau of Corrections Director-General Gerald Bantag was formally charged with murder for his

His wife, Kerima Tariman, died last year after an encounter with the military in Negros.

DECEMBER

The UP Board of Regents selected private lawyer and former Malacañang regent, Angelo Jimenez, as the 22nd UP president after hours of deliberation, besting five other nominees including UPD Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo, the sole nominee to receive the UP stakeholders’ endorsement. Jimenez will replace outgoing President Danilo Concepcion in February 2023.

Lapid was known for his program, Lapid Fire, which criticized the administration of former President Rodrigo Duterte, and his successor, Marcos. He died at the age of 63 and left behind his wife and six children. He is the third journalist to be killed in 2022 and the second since Marcos became president.

Meanwhile, Communist Party of the Philippines founder Jose Maria passed away on December 16 while in exile in the Netherlands. He was 83. Sison developed and applied MarxismLeninism-Maoism to the country’s conditions, eventually constructing a critique of Philippine society and building the party’s philosophy of national democracy with a socialist perspective.

Sebastianne Daiz

Pseudo-permanence

» Some parts of our life aren’t invariant. Affection, for one.

On the rare days I come home, my place is always deemed a mess. My bed case isn’t perfectly folded and tucked along the corners of the bed, my blankets and pillowcases are creased. I have this unending belief that my objects, fleeting properties, and my bed will remain invariant through time. An organized mess, that’s what they called it—so I frowned on anyone who dared to tidy my place.

Each object has its own permanent location in space, unmoved by the forces outside, at rest through time. My immaculate belief in the invariance of location, or at least, tangible things, has led me to the doom that surrounds me now. This is neither seasonal depression nor the proverbial holiday blues. I refuse to put the blame on anyone for how disorganized I am, and how this, if not averted, could lead me to a catastrophe.

Some parts of our life, however, aren’t invariant. Affection, for one. Your relationship, for instance, may not be paused at one point in your timeline and pray that your partner will remain situated at that frozen moment. Even loving itself is impermanent–it’s uncertain at every step of the way which direction to take.

For three long years, I’ve made myself believe that we’ll remain constant amid the pandemic and everything else in between. But the yearning for constancy inevitably led us to lose grasp of our relationship as we ventured this path of you and me becoming a physician and physicist, respectively. We never had the illusion of becoming each other’s focal point, but undeniably, we had to take the back seat as my problem sets, your pathologies and their prognosis, the political brouhaha, and this publication must be prioritized.

But you with your near daily exams and me with my near daily deadlines have forced us to become more insular, more decoupled.

Daniel

Keian Florino

FIRST PERSON

FIRST PERSON

When we were younger, I thought that things would eventually turn out differently. That at the very least, we’d become more mindful of the things that truly matter for both of us. After all, I never expected us to be in a normal and picturesque partnership. But you with your near daily exams and me with my near daily deadlines have forced us to become more insular, more decoupled. Our conversations have to be paused, and sometimes never revisited, because of urgent matters, movie nights have been sacrificed to catch up with our missed lectures, and dates have to be scheduled months in advance because of the unpredictability of our lives.

Your ever-grueling medical school and my unending presswork matters are commitments that are equally taxing. In that process, we’ve made personal sacrifices under the premise that we’ll always be there for each other at the end of the day.

We’ve tried to remind and reassure each other of that commitment. But it seems that the world has conjured up something to distance us most of the time. I cannot even recall when was the last time we talked openly about ourselves and our path forward. Questions and hesitation have compounded upon me–waiting to be answered and waiting for that perfect moment to bring them up.

Time is our enemy, it seems. We never had the chance to sit down and discuss. And so we move on with our lives. This is just a temporary discomfort, I will tell myself. We’ve been patient with each other–with my unrelenting meetings and presswork, and your deluge of theoretical and clinical examinations. Patience, however, turned out to be a band-aid solution, akin to sweeping our woes under the rug. And in that process, the optimism that we’ll get better is slowly escaping me.

Perhaps, it’s neither optimism nor patience that we have to cling to. The myth of the invariance of relationships needs to be shattered. We’ve reached this point in our lives and in this relationship, so a clear-eyed resolve to recalibrate ourselves should be our priority. After all, responsibilities are fleeting, relationships aren’t. In that sense, they are supposed to be permanent. But intimacy, attachment, and affection are perennial values that need constant re-evaluation and fostering.

Confronting our troubles takes time, strength, and courage. We’ve seen worse and better days together and on those days we’ve held onto each other. There will be better days, just not today. But until that happens, I yearn to seek your refuge. When all is said and done, we still have each other–and I hope that we keep it that way.

«

We’ve reached this point in our lives and in this relationship, so a clear-eyed resolve to recalibrate ourselves should be our priority.

As the education system continues to diminish, the administration continues to push the immediate approval of Mandatory ROTC. It seems the government is more ready to equip the youth with firearms than with knowledge.

Illustration by Elisha Montemayor

PHILIPPINE COLLEGIAN CALL TO VIGILANCE

The UP community will welcome Angelo Jimenez’s presidency with militancy and assertion as he takes his seat in February 2023. The studentry is called to unite and hold him accountable for every decision and actions the UP System will take for the next six years.

Cover photos by Ar Jay Revilla and Luisa Elago