Posts

Peoples’ lawyers vow to continue defending human rights ‘alongside the poor and oppressed’

/in /by

Public interest lawyers vowed to persevere in defending human rights as the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL) holds its two-day national congress starting today in Manila.

Themed “Conquering Challenges in People’s Lawyering: Unifying Our Ranks to Strengthen the Protection and Advancement of Human Rights in the Face of Adversity,” the country’s top human rights lawyers said they are not fazed with the threats they face, even if some of their colleagues have paid for their advocacy with their very lives.

“We will win this battle against impunity because we are on the side of truth and the people,” NUPL chairperson Neri Colmenares said in his speech.

“In the line of fire is always a place of honor,” Supreme Court Associate Justice Marvic Leonen, quoting the late activist Lean Alejandro, told NUPL 5th Congress delegates in encouraging them against harassment.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Marvic Leonen in his keynote speech praised the NUPL as the country’s most passionate human rights defenders even in the face of harassments and being in the line of fire.

“You do not only define public interest lawyering, you live it,” Leonen said.

Leonen added it is time the country recognizes the NUPL’s brand of lawyering and its passion for justice.

Established in 2007, the NUPL has grown from 89 to around 500 members spread across more than 50 chapters nationwide, taking on the most celebrated human rights cases in more than decade.

Lawyers for the oppressed

In his opening remarks, NUPL president Edre Olalia said the NUPL remains committed to peoples’ lawyering “for the demands and aspirations of the Filipino people, especially the poor and the oppressed.”

“We are the lawyers of the exploited, persecuted and marginalized. We are in the legal forefront in the fight against impunity. We are the ones on the ground as we fight in the legal trenches and foxholes,” he added.

Olalia called on his colleagues to close ranks and fight back against “vicious attacks, weaponization of the law by a blitzkreig of legal attacks.”

  • NUPL 5th Congress delegates.

The guests in the event’s opening ceremonies include Concepcion Empeño and Erlinda Cadapan, mothers of University of the Philippines students Karen and Sherlyn abducted by retired Philippine Army Major General Jovito Palparan.

Also present were Raymond Manalo, Celia Veloso and mothers of victims of President Rodrigo Duterte’s  drug war.

In her speech, Veloso said their family could not contain their joy when the NUPL successfully convinced the Supreme Court to allow Mary Jane’s diposition, giving them hope the overseas Filipino worker may still be saved from execution in Indonesia.

Other guests included former Senator Rene Saguisag, Ateneo Law School dean Antonio Laviña and Integrated Bar of the Philippines President Egon Cayosa.

Manila Mayor Isko Moreno gave the welcome remarks. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Mga abugado humingi ng proteksyon sa Korte Suprema

/in /by

Nagtungo sa Korte Suprema sa Maynila ang grupong National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers o NUPL noong Abril 15 para maghain ng petisyon para sa Writ of Amparo at Writ of Habeas Data laban sa pananakot at harassment ng Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).

Sinamahan sila ng kanilang mga abugado mula sa Public Interest Law Center.

Ayon kay Atty. Edre Olalia, pangulo ng NUPL, layunin ng petisyon na mabigyan sila ng proteksyon ng Kataas-taasang Hukuman laban sa mga banta at red-tagging sa kanilang mga kasapi.

Kabilang sa mga respondent sa petisyon ay sina Pangulong Rodrigo Duterte, National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr., Defense Sec. Delfin Lorenzana at AFP Civil Military Operations Chief General Antonio Parlade Jr.

Isa si Parlade na inakusahan ang NUPL na supporter ng Communist Party of the Philippines at New Peoples Army subalit mariing pinabulaan ng grupo at sinabing walang basehan ang mga paratang nito.

Nababahala ang NUPL sa ganitong pananakot. Ayon sa kanila, simula nang manungkulan si Pangulong Duterte ay 36 abugado na ang napapatay.

Pinakahuli dito ay si Atty. Benjamin Ramos na upisyal ng NUPL sa Negros na pinaslang noong Nobyembre 2018 sa Kabankalan City. (Bidyo ni Joseph Cuevas/ Kodao)

Being a lawyer at a turbulent crossroads

/0 Comments/in /by

‘Redeem what has been lost, repair what has been cracked, and reform what needs to be changed. Lawyer for the people.’

The National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL) heartily congratulates all those who passed the 2017 bar examinations. In the same vein, we also send our sincerest felicitations to those who did not find their names on the list this time. To have hurdled the four gruelling bar Sundays is an achievement in itself.

By this time, especially highlighted with the recent events in our country, we have validated that one’s performance in the bar examinations is never an accurate measure or guarantee of one’s competence to become a lawyer, much less one’s capacity to put into practice the oath that we swore to uphold: to do and uphold justice.

The entire legal system is again now under even more vicious attack. There is an attempt to cripple and hold hostage the country’s entire judicial system. There are continuing direct assaults against judicial independence. Infighting and self-interests are dressed up as principled non-partisan positions. There is an even more intense erosion of people’s trust in the credibility and integrity of the justice system.

Many of these oddities are perpetrated no less than members of the legal profession themselves who have allowed themselves to break and corrupt their oaths to be dispensers of justice by being instruments of the creeping and impending tyrannical rule in the country.

Institutions are under siege, either through brazen threats or insidious manipulation. Legal shortcuts are the rule rather than the exception in fighting crime and in law enforcement. Borderless basic human rights of free expression, free press, and assembly, nay expressions of humanity, are curtailed. International legal norms are scoffed at. Legal remedies are twisted and legal fora are used to persecute those who defy and refuse to toe the anti-people line.

Ambulance-chasers and pretentious legal toads or clowns prancing like invincible erudite authorities or shameless scumbags test our fortitude if not our capacities to suspend disbelief. Facts are replaced by alternative truths and fake news are peddled as the new normal.

Shall we just look the other way and turn blind to reality, content with dealing with our respective devices?

We shall not. All is not lost. Reason, fairness, common sense, honor, truth, dignity and justice must be reclaimed.

As lawyers, we are duty bound, under oath, to be dispensers of justice and as Filipinos, we are morally and historically bound to struggle and protect our freedom and dignity as a people and as a nation.

We therefore call on our present and new pañeros and pañeras to join the ranks of peoples’ lawyers and to unite with the Filipino people in the continuing fight for freedom and democracy.

Redeem what has been lost, repair what has been cracked, and reform what needs to be changed. Lawyer for the people. #

 

Edre U. Olalia, NUPL President

Ephraim B. Cortez NUPL Secretary General ‭