Thursday, November 08, 2007 ‘Training ground for trapos’
CANDIDATES in the youth polls last Oct. 29 “resorted to vote-buying,” a Cebu City official noted, and this does not bode well for the country’s future leaders.
The City Council yesterday asked both the House of Representatives and the Senate to thoroughly review the implementing rules and regulations governing the Sangguniang Kabataan (SK).
The move was made after City Councilor Edgardo Labella delivered a privilege speech lamenting that even SK candidates “resorted to vote-buying, herding members in one place and giving them money” in the Oct. 29 elections.
“Others have spent excessively during the campaign, making the Sangguniang Kabataaan an academy of obnoxious traditional politics instead of becoming a good training ground for the country’s future leaders,” he said.
City Councilor Rodrigo Abellanosa replied that what happened during the synchronized barangay and SK elections reflects the reality in our elections.
“We might as well ask to include the barangay elections, which were supposed to be non-partisan,” he said.
He emphasized the importance of the barangays as the “bulwark of service,” where people of expertise instead of people who help get the votes for the officials are the ones supposedly hired.
Councilor Arsenio Pacaña reminded everyone that something has to be done, saying sinning is not only through commission but also through omission, or failing to do what is right.
In his speech, Labella mentioned Section 13, Article II of the Constitution that declares the youth as the country’s hope.
This is embodied in the SK’s creation through the enactment of Republic Act 7160, or the Local Government Code of 1991, “with the noble aim of instituting youth development and leadership attuned to the pro-youth tenets of the Constitution.”
Labella said, though, that despite the noted ills of the system, he would rather have reforms introduced in the SK law instead of abolishing it as espoused by many sectors.
“We know that only a small percentage of the SK candidates were, directly or indirectly, involved in highly questionable activities during the synchronized polls,” the councilor said.
An SK reform bill is pending before the Senate and House of Representatives.
It contains a provision amending the age bracket from 15 to below 18, to 15 to 21 years old—a proposal endorsed by the University of the Philippines Center for Integrative and Development Studies.
The study, supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund, was made to assess the impact and effectiveness of the SK. (RHM)
