Waking Up From a Political Lull
From the Editorial Board
The amendments to the University Electoral Code (UEC) remain to be highly contentious and divisive among student leaders since it was first introduced this time last year by the 42nd UP Manila University Student Council (UPM USC). The most significant proposed amendments are the removal of the abstention vote and the 50%+1 voting threshold in determining the winners. While students acknowledge the urgency of resolving the perceived political lull in the university which affects student representation, they are divided as to how it must be addressed and what should be done to improve political participation of the student body.
In 2018, for the first time in the history of UP Manila student politics, the general elections concluded the academic year with an incomplete USC slate after the two lone standard-bearer candidates lost to abstention, while only two out of seven councilor candidates met the 50%+1 threshold to be elected. However, student leaders at the time claimed that the Office of the Student Affairs (OSA), acting as an ex-officio member of the University Electoral Board, illegally introduced the abstention vote and the 50%+1. They only implemented the said provisions, which were previously non-existent in the electoral code, during the election period. This led to a series of protests by then-political parties ASAP Katipunan and Bigkis UPM along with other supporters of the candidates.
Institutions such as OSA and other pertinent offices in the university should be held accountable for their contribution to the current sorry state of student politics. While student councils are fighting for student representation and rights, the only thing that the UP Manila administration did was to further curtail spaces where students could organize. On top of the reduction of physical spaces due to non-stop construction, they continue to legitimize the incursions of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in the university which continue to suppress the rights of the youth through intimidation and other forms of harassment.
If anything, the low political participation of students only serves the interest of the administration that coddles known perpetrators of violence and human rights supression, as well as militarization of the university leading to the repression of academic freedom.
Arguments presented by proponents of the amendments also suggest that student participation is virtually dying. However, student participation must be viewed from two perspectives: their participation in the election as voters and as candidates. For nearly a decade since 2011, the yearly voter turnout consistently breached the 50-percent mark. It was only in 2018 that it went slightly below at 47.9% and further decreased in the next two elections, but was able to bounce back to 49.41% a year later. When student elections went back to voting after the implementation of appointments in 2021, the 2022 general elections garnered a 47.81% turnout. It is important to note that the elected 43rd USC officers, in an interview, said that they were able to come up with that turnout because of intensified social media presence and an updated online balloting system.
In contrast, the participation of students as USC candidates has been declining since the 2018 elections. This was a glaring concern during the pandemic when the UEB had to extend the deadline for the filing of candidacy several times. Students may see council work as an additional burden on top of their academic and personal workloads, especially in a constituent unit with the Return Service Agreement (RSA) that remains as a burden to the students.
Student leaders must also explore and address the changing political landscape within the university since the dissolution of the two then-prominent political parties, ASAP Katipunan and BIGKIS UPM. Ever since then, political parties indicating different colors attempted to represent various student campaigns. The proliferation of political parties in the university may suggest the changing centers of power and even changing needs of the students. Putting this into context would definitely provide strong theoretical and historical underpinnings in understanding the development of student politics in the university.
Moving forward, university electoral institutions including local college councils, student organizations, and formations must intensify their efforts to integrate local and national issues that directly affect the studentry to increase political participation of the students. In the last student evaluation of the UPM USC, The Manila Collegian noted that while students recognized the campaigns by the 41st USC, they must increase their presence both on-ground and online.
“Be more open and influential in getting the involvement of the entire student body. [Improve in terms of] command and presence. I feel that the student [council] lacks a more authoritative aura. Although it’s good that the image they portrayed is that of an approachable and empathetic council, I believe it would do good had the council established a more ‘firm’ character,” mentioned a participant in the survey conducted by The Manila Collegian.
Looking back on the timeline, student consultations were conducted at the end of the semester when students were accomplishing their final requirements and beginning to move out of Manila. USC published the proposed revisions on June 1 while the amendments were supposed to be deliberated on last June 24.
In pushing for such reforms, it must take into consideration the time frame which should: (1) use longer periods of time, and (2) not take place when students are most burdened with academic workload. These sentiments were also floated by the college representatives in the previous consultations, as time constraints severely affected their capacity to gather data from their constituents. With a compromised quality of data, they may fail to truly encapsulate the will of the student body and suffer from further alienation of students in the electoral process that should have been genuinely representing them in the first place.
In the history of electoral code reform around the world, there is no single mold that countries have taken to address the specific phenomenon at hand. It requires the creative application of existing knowledge integrated with proper interpretation of historical data and adequate understanding of the personal narratives and experiences of the people on the ground. Changing the fundamental facet of university politics and elections through inchoate and unrepresentative measures could only worsen the very problem that we are all trying to resolve as it would further divide the already fragmented politics in the university.
At this juncture, student council leaders must address the current phenomenon with student-centric measures that are holistic and cognizant of the nuances in discerning various aspects of why the development of campus politics in the university has led to this point. They should veer away from personality politics and steadfastly uphold the mandate entrusted to them by their constituents: to serve with utmost integrity, humility, and passion for the people.
In a time when human rights are being suppressed, the last thing that student council leaders should pursue is the reduction of power of the students in expressing and exercising their fundamental political rights. Just like what was argued in the series of student consultations, the elections are not the end-all, be-all of student participation and representation. Rather, it is only one of the many facets through which democratic rights of students could thrive and flourish. Enhancing many aspects of democratic participation in the university should start from the grassroots, working their way up to challenge the institution that has been suppressing the promise of academic freedom in the university.
