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Militant cadets push for alternatives to 'militarist' ROTC

BY EUGENE PINEDA
Northern Dispatch/Bulatlat.com

BAGUIO CITY --- After their successful mass walkouts in universities here, cadets of the Reserved Officers Training Corps (ROTC) are pushing for an alternative program outside the framework of a military training program.

"We will bring the cadets back to the people," quips Wilfredo Dizon, Anakbayan-UP Chairperson and convenor of the Union of Former Cadets (UFC). (Anakbayan is a progressive youth group.)

Dizon, a cadet, together with members of the League of Filipino Students (LFS), headed a successful walkout by 130 cadets of University of the Philippines College Baguio (UPCB) two weeks ago.

"Our alternatives like community integration, clean-and-green campaigns, tree planting, literacy program and other socio-civic activities will show that the ROTC program does not have the monopoly on these activities," he added.

Dizon said the alternative program will be done in the spirit of voluntarism and away from the "militarist" framework of ROTC. "Civic activities done out of the ROTC framework will free the cadets from the 'fault-finding eyes' of the officers," he added.

The Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) through Memorandum Order No. 10 gave cadets two options after their MS 11 and MS 12 military training subjects: to do Law Enforcement Service (LES) and Civic Welfare Service (CWS) instead of continuing with MS subjects. However, studies show that only 14 percent of ROTC units all over the country are implementing such alternative programs.

Meanwhile, the University of Baguio cadets also expressed willingness to do the alternative socio-civic activities after hundreds of UB cadets walked out of their training last July 29 to show their support to the ongoing call for the immediate abolition of what they characterize as rotten-to-the-core ROTC program. Northern Dispatch/Bulatlat.com

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