As a student, I disagree with the mandatory ROTC program.

The rights of many students will be

affected if that program will be implemented. There were too many people who suffered because
of ROTC. And if ROTC will be implemented again, a number of people might experience sufferings
and this will only increase the record. Officials said that they will implement ROTC to teach
discipline and nationalism. But there were cases of hazing just because of that ROTC. The big
question is, “Is this the only way to teach discipline to our students?”.

Imposing the ROTC results to the wasting of time of the students especially in their academic
performance due to its disadvantages that the students may encounter during their training.
Additional fees will be given to the students in buying uniforms and allotting so much of their
time at school more than school hours because of the training instead of doing their
requirements or relaxing is a huge hassle. You will have more responsibilities while studying in
senior high school, you will have more mandatory commitments than the average student. You
must take the classes required for your ROTC program in addition to all the classes required for
your major. You will have to participate in mandatory training events outside of class time; this
may eat up a chunk of your summer vacation too. Additionally, if you receive a scholarship, you
must maintain a minimum GPA to retain your eligibility. Also, the students will be exhausted due
to the training causing for them not to be able to scan their notes and will give them a hard time
to cope with their lessons. Moreover, the students cannot focus well with their specific fields for
the reason that ROTC will be added with the pain in their necks.

ROTC was previously implemented at the college level, but it was scrapped in 2002 after an
investigation showed that a University of Santo Tomas student was murdered after he exposed
alleged corruption in the program. The program was challenged because of the oppositions
mostly coming from student bodies and militant groups, due to reasons such as anomalies of
corruption, power tripping, verbal and physical abuse, contesting the rights and welfare of
students, and exposure of students to a culture of violence and fear According to Anakbayan
Chairperson Vencer Crisostomo if the ROTC becomes mandatory it will only get worse especially
in hazing and abuses. ROTC program was viewed with increasing discontent, especially from the
cadets themselves. Various abuses and corrupt practices were noted ranging from hazing and
other forms of violence, to financial extortion. An example of which is the death of Mark Welson
Chua, an ROTC cadet officer from the University of Santo Tomas who was murdered due to his
dissemination of information about the corruption in their school’s ROTC program. This was the
main reason why the Arroyo Administration amended the Republic Act 9163 or the National
Service Training Program (NSTP) Act of 2001 last 2002. It gave college students the preference to
choose between ROTC, Civic Welfare Training Service (CWTS), and Literacy Training Services (LTS)
making ROTC as only one of the options in the NSTP.

After failing to pass it in the 17th Congress, President Rodrigo Duterte once again called on
lawmakers to ensure the passage of a bill that would make the Reserve Officers' Training Corps
(ROTC) program mandatory for students in Grades 11 and 12. This mandatory ROTC program may
appear useless for some students who wants to focus with specialized subjects rather than ROTC
therefore this may result to corruption because the students could pay off their commandants to
pass the course and skip all the marching and hot uniforms. It is okay if it is not compulsory,
because some students may want to focus in their specialization and some are not favoured to
have that subject ROTC and they may think that they cannot benefit in it, because they don’t
want to work in outdoor. It may be useless for the students that the courses taken is not closely
related to that subject. Instead they may focused their mind in their specialization course.
Duterte himself wants ROTC to become mandatory for students. But the President had also
claimed in public speeches that he had tried to skip ROTC as a student.

Regarding with the issue on instilling nationalism, there are lots or programs or actions that
may help the Filipino people to show their love for the country. Instead of implementing ROTC
why don’t we promote better path for the socio-civic involvement of the youth, a path that is
congruent to the challenges of the changing times. Nationalism can be instilled by teaching local
language and history, not by implementing the Reserved Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) program.
It cannot be done through ROTC, which teaches young people only to follow orders without
thinking. We can only produce puppets who can’t think and speak for themselves.