Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 2) — A House of Representatives committee has approved the consolidated version of three bills seeking to institutionalize the abrogated 1989 agreement which prohibits the entry of state forces to University of the Philippines campuses without prior notice.
The lower chamber’s Committee on Higher and Technical Education on Wednesday passed the still unnumbered measure in substitution of House Bill nos. 8437, 8514, and 8545. It seeks to include the terminated accord between UP and the Department of National Defense into Republic Act 9500 or the UP Charter.
Lawmakers who authored the different versions of the bill have stressed the need to uphold academic freedom in UP, especially of those joining protest actions, by preventing the intrusion of state security forces.
They said the bill also aims to protect UP community members’ right to due process. For one, it states search or arrest warrants cannot be served against any UP student, faculty member, staff or invited participant in activities in the campus without prior notification to university officials. The warrant should also be served in the presence of at least two faculty members.
In the explanatory note of HB 8545, congressmen said reports that the accord had been breached before it was abrogated show Filipino students face a “climate of red-tagging, fear mongering, intimidation and other forms of harassment.”
“Thus, the UP-DND accord is far from being moot and academic, contrary to DND’s claim in their letter addressed to UP President Danilo L. Concepcion unilaterally terminating the said agreement,” it said.
In January, the DND moved to unilaterally abrogate the three-decade long pact with UP. The department cited communist organizations’ supposed “clandestine recruitment” of students and stressed the need to “protect the rights of the majority” of Filipinos.
During the same month, a similar bill seeking to insert the accord into the UP Charter was filed in the Senate.
