Sara, Walden spar over mandatory military service

Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte and former party-list lawmaker Walden Bello exchanged words over the mayor’s proposal to make military service mandatory among Filipinos.

Both are running for vice president in the May 2022 elections.

In an online event Wednesday, Duterte said she would propose to Congress to pass a bill that will "make military service mandatory for all 18-year-olds" male and female in the country.

"Nakikita po natin ito sa ibang bansa, sa South Korea, Israel. Nakikita po natin doon sa kanila," she said during the online caravan.

"Hindi ROTC lang na isang subject, isang weekend o isang buwan sa isang taon. Dapat lahat kapag  tungtong mo ng 18 years old, you will be given a subsidy, you will be asked to serve our country doon sa ating Armed Forces of the Philippines," Duterte added, referring to the Reserved Officers Training Program.

On Twitter, Bello said Duterte’s “pledge to use the OVP to promote mandatory military service reveals her for the dictator-in-waiting she is, and tells us that she will be no different from Duterte Sr.”

“Like father, like daughter.  Duterte’s legacy was to arm people and tell them to kill.  Now his daughter wants to do it to the youth as well,” Bello added.

Issuing a sharp retort, Sara accused Bello of being “stuck” with the idea of dictatorship, which he linked with the youth’s military service.

“Only the likes of Mr. Bello would think of mandatory military service for its citizens as arming them and telling them to kill — instead of looking at it as something that inspires patriotism in the youth,” she said in a statement.

“If only Mr. Bello did not stop at what he has been so stuck in over the past many years — dictatorship in the Philippines, something that we know is a lie in the present time — he would have a better understanding of what I truly stand for,” she added.

Sara also called Bello’s “obsession over dictatorship” as “ancient as the belief that the youth have no actual important role in building a nation.”

“I truly hope that our youth do not grow up to be a Walden Bello — an ungrateful citizen who sleeps peacefully at the comfort of their homes, unable to say a prayer or a silent ‘thank you’ to the men and women who became martyrs while countering violent extremism, insurgency, and terrorism,” she said.

Sara also stressed that 18-year-olds are no longer children, adding that aside from pitching military service for them, she also pointed out the need for the youth to be ready for disasters.

“The youth, I also said, should also play active roles in advancing their own welfare — particularly in the aspect of health, education, gender equality, and reproductive issues. I wanted them to be able to stand on their own, help themselves, help the communities, and help the nation,” she said.

The mandatory Reserved Officers Training Course (ROTC) program was scrapped in 2002 following the passage of Republic Act 9163, an act establishing the National Service Training Program (NSTP).

The law was passed following the March 2001 killing of UST student Mark Wilson Chua allegedly by his ROTC handlers after he exposed the supposed corruption in the ROTC corps.

In 2019 during his State of the Nation Address, President Rodrigo Duterte urged lawmakers anew to support the proposed mandatory ROTC program in public and private senior high schools.  —LDF, GMA News