Instead of a systemwide academic freedom committee, the Office of the Vice President for Public Affairs (OVPPA) Media and Public Relations Office will be reorganized this month to act as the “first line of defense” against rights violations.

With several recent incidents of profiling and harassment throughout the system, the university administration believes that this arm, along with other measures, would improve the consultative responses that the community clamors for.

But this move falls short of the creation of a systemwide Committee on Academic Freedom and Human Rights (CAFHR), a proposal more supported by sectors of the university, who now wonder if the new mechanisms of the administration to protect academic freedom will have teeth. 

Top-Down Approach

The rebranded arm would be a centralized office that would coordinate with sectors, other offices, and individual constituent units to provide legal and welfare assistance to university constituents affected by state attacks, said Jose Alcantara, executive vice president for public affairs, in an interview with the Collegian.

“Ang pwedeng gawin ng Office of the President is to strengthen a section where that section is to focus on UP sectoral issues and concerns. [The Media and Public Relations Office] might become the central nerve center ng mga pangangailangan ng mga sektor, mga estudyante,” Alcantara said.

Before, the administration’s response to cases was reactive and mainly centered on legal assistance, as with the UP student arrested for defacing the US embassy last year.

Without coordination between offices and sectors, long-term responses were non-existent. No systemwide database of the number and types of violations to academic freedom exists, for one, which Alcantara said could help clarify the state of academic freedom in UP.

But such duties are exactly what an institutionalized academic freedom committee would have been for, at least according to the proposal of the Office of the Faculty Regent and the All UP Academic Employees Union last year. The committee could also recommend policies, release public statements, organize campaigns, and coordinate with government agencies.

“We think that [the committee] should go through proper consultations, to broaden and to refine yung na-identify na functions and roles of academic freedom committee. Kasi if we allow simply [the proposal to pass], baka it creates a limiting factor rather than a truly functional, productive committee,” Alcantara said.

However, the clamor for the creation of the committee has already gone under extensive consultation. Both faculty and university employees supported last year’s proposal, and the General Assembly of Student Councils approved a resolution pushing for the CAHFR’s institutionalization in its latest convention.

Despite that, UP President Angelo Jimenez has yet to sign the administrative order to create the committee.

Instead, the new arm would provide a top-heavy organizational structure, being directly under the OVPPA, and consequently, the Office of the President. Alcantara also floated the possibility of the Presidential Advisory Council, composed of all the chancellors of UP’s campuses, acting with the same functions as the CAFHR.

But this approach could come at the expense of consultations with university sectors. “The OSR (Office of the Student Regent) maintains that important and necessary safeguard pa rin ang CAFHR, since opportunity ito for all sectors to be represented,” Francesca Duran, student regent, told the Collegian.

No Consultation

Alcantara, meanwhile, also expressed support for mandating the establishment of academic freedom committees at the constituent unit (CU) level.

“I would think that if you would put that on the table of the [advisory council] of the chancellors, they would say yes on the CU level. Dapat nandon yon because [the chancellors] are the protector of advocacy of academic freedom,” he said.

Currently, three campuses have established their own academic freedom committees. UP Cebu established the first in 2022, then UP Manila in December 2023, and finally UP Diliman last March. The university councils of UP Baguio, UP Visayas, UP Los Baños, and UP Mindanao have also released statements of support for the creation of such a committee.

The committees are composed of representatives from all the university’s sectors. UP Diliman’s committee, for instance, is chaired by Vice Chancellor for Community Affairs Roehl Jamon, and composed of UP Diliman officials, representatives from the University Student Council, All UP Academic Employees Union, and the All UP Workers Union, and the UP Campus barangay captain.

The proposed systemwide committee would be similarly composed of sectoral representatives and university officials, but on a centralized level that more closely coordinates among different units. This representation is missing in the UP administration’s proposed media arm.

The lack of sectoral representatives could backfire on the university, especially after the administration came under fire for its lack of consultation with the recently signed UP-AFP Declaration of Cooperation.

The declaration supposedly covers agreements for research between the Center for Integrative Studies and the state’s armed forces. But its nebulous mechanisms for personnel visits and areas of future cooperation mean that sectors view the document as a threat to academic freedom.

“Nakikita na natin na sumusulpot sa iba-ibang CUs ang academic freedom panel, pero kailangan na itong ma-forward at maipanawagan talaga na itong committee na bubuuin sa systemwide level… [dito, dapat] consultative and nag-pa-participate actively yung iba-ibang sectors ng university,” Duran said.

Sectoral Response

Without the systemwide committee, the task of organizing falls to sectoral formations, such as the regent offices and student councils, and networks like the Defend UP Network. But both are beset with organizational and manpower problems, said Duran.

The network was made after the abrogation of the UP-DND accord, with its primary objective being to campaign to reinstate the agreement that bars state forces entry on campus grounds without prior approval from the university. But issues such as the signing of the Declaration of Cooperation and the lack of an academic freedom committee now have to be brought to light.

“Yun din talaga ang i-se-seek na gawin ng Defend UP Network ngayon; na hindi lang yung convenors nito ang gagalaw … pero mapakilos din yung iba-ibang organizations na members, and sila mismo ay bitbit din kung ano yung mga demands and yung mga activities na i-ho-hold ng network as a whole,” Duran said. 

While Duran welcomed the alternative mechanisms proposed by the system, she asserts that for networks to be strengthened and approaches to become truly consultative, the university must still heed the sectors' calls.

“We have seen before na kapag nagka-clamor and after a dialogue, na-push [ang administration] and nagawan na siya ng roadmap. The same applies sa CAFHR, na makapag-mount talaga tayo ng mass movement and mapaalam sa administrasyon na mayroong ganitong panawagan yung community,” Duran said. ●