THE Duterte Administration wants to revive the mandatory Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) program and have the same implemented as part of the senior high school curriculum.
President Rodrigo Duterte recently cited the need for ROTC to “instill patriotism, love of country among our youth.” This is obviously because ROTC is valuable when Filipinos need to defend the Philippines. The President also cited ROTC being a constitutional requirement as the 1987 Philippine Constitution specifically provides that “the Government may call upon the people to defend the State and, in the fulfillment thereof, all citizens may be required, under conditions provided by law, to render personal military or civil service” (Section 4, Article II).
While there is no question on the need for the government to prepare the people in defending the Philippines, if the need arises, the revival of the mandatory ROTC needs to be pursued in ways that will ensure that the program will serve such purpose and it will not facilitate the worsening of other societal problems like corruption.
The mandatory ROTC program was scrapped in 2001 and was replaced by the National Service Training Program (NSTP) through the passage of Republic Act No. 9163. The said law still provides for ROTC but only as an option for students and undergoing said program was made voluntary.
Let us not forget that the scrapping of the mandatory ROTC was made following the murder of University of Santo Tomas student Mark Welson Chua, who exposed corruption in the ROTC unit in the university.
The murder of Mark Welson Chua became the tipping point as there were many other cases of corruption in the implementation of ROTC programs throughout the country.
The matter on the revival of the mandatory ROTC should focus on measures that will insulate the program from opportunities of corruption and other crimes such as hazing.
There is also the obvious need for our lawmakers to ensure that the training content will indeed serve the purpose of preparing our youth to defend our country when called by the State to do so.
Mechanisms for the effective implementation of the program are also needed. Such mechanisms should include, among others, the setting of standards on the quality of training given to the students and objective measures to determine if such standards are met.
What our country needs is an ROTC program that can effectively prepare our youth for military service to defend our country and not one that will breed corruption and simply waste our youth’s time.
