Kalipunan ng Kristiyanong Kabataan sa Pilipinas (KKKP) statement on the unilateral termination on the UP-DND Accord
The Kalipunan ng Kristiyanong Kabataan sa Pilipinas (KKKP) stands in solidarity with the University of the Philippines system in resisting the Department of National Defense’s unilateral termination of the long-standing UP-DND Accord.
Until this termination, the agreement prohibited police and military forces from entering 17 UP campuses without prior notice to the school administration. This gesture has served to memorialize the violence UP and its students were subjected to by state forces during the dark days of Marcos’ martial law. Activists, school officials and the general student body, among other groups, exerted efforts to forge this agreement in 1989.
Schools are said to be marketplaces of ideas. Filipino colleges and universities aim to foster critical and free thinking, and have generally encouraged academic freedom. Schools like UP hone a sense of nationalism, excellence, and service in large part because they have been deemed as safe spaces to discuss and debate ideas.
Moreover, the agreement has enabled UP to provide safe spaces for activism. In the past years, its campuses offered sanctuaries to marginalized groups, such as Lumad and farmers. During the lockdowns, UP also turned into a secure place for protest, a right enshrined in the Constitution. This safeguard disappears with the dissolution of the accord.
KKKP also believes that the one-sided discontinuation of the agreement presages state intrusion into the Philippine academe, in general. If they can take down UP, what stops them from an unnecessary, paranoid purge of all academic institutions. The uninhibited entry of state forces into school grounds, UP and otherwise, encroaches on our academic freedom, our prophetic mission to shelter those who seek it, and our understanding of schools as zones of peace.
We cannot allow this attack on the critical minds and voices of our youth. Uphold the UP-DND Accord!
#DefendUP
#DefendAcademicFreedom
#StopCampusMilitarization
#JunkTerrorLaw
