Lawyers’ group to mark Constitution Day

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO - The Vanguard of the Philippine Constitution (VPCI) will celebrate on Saturday, February 2, the 26th anniversary of the 1987 Philippine Constitution at the Fiesta Pavillion of Manila Hotel.

Lawyer Eligio P. Mallari, VPCI president and former Human Rights Commissioner, said Senator Allan Peter Cayetano will be the guest of honor and speaker.

Mallari said the board of governors of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) including legal luminaries, judges and justices as well as prominent business leaders will attend the celebration.

“We expect no less than the attendance of 300 officers and members consisting the regional governors in the country's 13 regions,” Mallari, former president of the Philippine VPCI Trial Lawyers Association and IBP Pampanga chapter, said.

The group's new members will also take their oath before Cayetano during the celebration, he said.

The VPCI is the only non-profit, non-stock organization registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission that admits only lawyers of good standing. It celebrates Constitution Day on February 2 each year, it being the date of the ratification of the Constitution of 1987.

Mallari said that former President Cory Aquino, through Proclamation No. 211 declared the date as Constitution Day “in order to instill in the hearts and minds of the Filipino people the democratic principles and the noble and lofty ideals enshrined in the Constitution.”