Taking offense at the European Union’s (EU) comments on the excesses of his war on drugs, especially as these are seen as human-rights violations, our President has bad-mouthed the EU, daring it to withdraw its aid to the country and suggesting the EU go to purgatory (hell, it seems, is reserved for the US President).
I thought I’d get to know more about what the EU is doing in the Philippines in terms of aid programs, and here are some examples.
There is the EU-Philippines Justice Support Programm, (EP JUST II), which is an EU initiative being undertaken with the Philippine government and the private sector. The aim is to assist “all citizens of the Philippines, in general, and the poor and disadvantaged, including women, children, minorities, indigenous peoples and human-rights and social activists, in particular, to achieve equitable access to and efficient enforcement of justice.”
The program supported the government and civil society to achieve three identified general objectives (components): (a) enhancing accessibility of people to legal information and assistance; (b) fighting impunity by making the criminal justice system more efficient in preventing and punishing major crimes, in general, and extralegal killings and enforced disappearances, in particular; and (c) enhancing transparency and accountability by strengthening the tools to measure the justice system’s performance.
As a specific example of the implementation of the EP JUST II, there’s the Community and Service-Oriented Policing (CSOP) in Puerto Princesa, Palawan, a flagship project of National Police Commission. The CSOP system is a framework for coordination and collaboration in helping bring about peace and order and public safety with the participation of the city mayor, Napolcom, Philippine National Police, barangay captain, Department of Education officials and the local judge, with the help of the EP JUST II team.
The collaboration is particularly focused on how to effectively deal with drug use and its consequences.
Also in Palawan, there’s the Access to Justice Network launched in August 2015, a very-focused attempt to provide Muslim Filipinos the ability to take up legal issues through access to referral pathways. The support was provided through the training of 50 facilitators and the primary beneficiaries targeted are walk-in clients with legal concerns, women and children, farmers, indigenous peoples (IPs), Muslim Filipinos, the elderly and people with disabilities.
The EP JUST II Program funded the development of the case management system (CMS) of the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP), began in early 2014 and completed in January 2016. This system enables the NCIP manage, monitor and track cases brought before it from IPs from around the country, as the NCIP performs its quasijudicial functions. Training for regional hearing officers, plus
computers/peripherals for their offices, is part of the package.
The program continues the efforts of two previous EU projects: “Improving Governance to Reduce Poverty, Access to Justice for the Poor” (November 2006 to August 2008); and the EP-JUST (November 2009-July 2011). The delegation of the EU is the funding source; the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) is the executing authority; and a Programme Task Force performs day-to-day management of the program. There’s a Project Steering Committee, chaired by the Department of the Interior and Local Government, with representatives from the Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of Justice, Department of Social Welfare and Development, National Economic and Development Authority, Supreme Court, Comission on Human Rights, National Commission on Human Rights, National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, National Commission on Muslim Filipinos and civil-society organizations.
As we note the structure of implementing the EU program, it is not just about money doled out, but about the knowledge-sharing, the capacity-building and the technical exercise flow-through in addressing common concerns, in this case, “the rule of law as a key driver of economic growth and poverty alleviation.”
The whole program is anchored on the basis of partnership with the government and the target sectors or communities. This partnership spirit is imbedded in the Filipino communities served through the years, and just cannot be so simply disentangled or abandoned in a moment of personal pique.
I also read that the EU is extending P9 billion in assistance to the Philippines for energy-related projects through the Access to Sustainability Energy Program (Asep) working jointly with the Department of Energy. In the program launch on October 7, 2016, EU Ambassador Franz Jessen declared, “We see that the Philippines, and the EU are sharing many objectives looking forward on issues such as climate change, sustainable energy, pro-poor agenda, trying to lift people out of poverty.”
More specifically, Asep’s financing assistance aims to provide clean-energy solutions to 100,000 households, add 20 megawatts in renewable-energy projects and generate savings equivalent to a 50-MW power plant through improved energy efficiencies.
The DOE is also reported to be identifying projects that could be included under this three to four years’ agreement, focusing on clean-energy development.
Shouldn’t we be more circumspect then about consigning longtime friends and partners to purgatory? or hell?