NATIONS

REVIVAL OF MANDATORY ROTC: WOMEN, YOUTH GROUPS RAISE CONCERNS

One of the priority legislative agendas of President Marcos is including the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) mandatory for the youth, which was stated in his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) on the 25th of July 2022 The plans to revive mandatory ROTC have then opened the program's controversies from the past

According to Vice President and Department of Education (DepEd) Secretary Sara Duterte, the ROTC program will cover higher or tertiary education students The curriculum will emphasize fundamental military training for national defense readiness, but it also specifies that no student under the age of 18 will directly participate in hostilities.

This prepares the students for national defense, including disaster preparedness and capacity building for risk-related scenarios in which they deem motivating, organizing, training, and mobilizing the students crucial. However, due to past issues that halted the program, numerous oppositions have been reiterated

Oppositions To The Revival Of Mandatory Rotc

Numerous youth and socio-civic organizations, such as Gabriela Youth, Bahaghari, and many more, have signed a petition against the revival of the mandatory ROTC program

The groups cited the numerous cases of sexual violence during training as evidence that the ROTC program encourages a macho, sexist, homophobic, and violent mentality.

Although the program aims to instill a sense of patriotism and mobilization for national defense preparedness, it has historically resulted in killings and other human rights abuses At least 14 instances of hazing, sexual abuse, physical assault, and murder have been documented by the National Union of Students of the Philippines (NUSP) since 1995

Additionally, though the Department of National Defense had issued a warning on the lack of military people to staff the program, senators are convinced to make the Reserve Officers Training Corps mandatory Col Ronald Jess Alcudia, executive commander of the military's reserve and retiree affairs, claimed that even if ROTC were made optional, there would not be enough employees to staff all of the program's 330,000 units

Following the exposure of the unjust practices that were experienced by some Filipino students in the mandatory ROTC program, the Republic Act 9163, or the National Service Training Program (NSTP) Act, was passed. This gave college students a choice among ROTC, Civil Welfare Training Service (CWTS), and Literacy Training Service (LTS) for the required NSTP program.

In response to the plans to revive the mandatory ROTC, the groups are urging the government to allocate more time for general education courses like social sciences, history, and Filipino. Most importantly, they deemed it essential that in helping the kids build nationalism and patriotism, they urge that the National Service Training Program (NSTP) should be strengthened to better teach young people about human rights, ecological services, comprehensive community service, and disaster preparedness NSTP is currently taught at the tertiary level and seeks to encourage students' involvement in public and civic affairs by fostering nationalism and civic consciousness.