Law, advocacy and kids in Cebu

CEBU CITY—There is no truth to the “rumor” that today’s kids do not know current issues, do not comprehend what they read and do not listen.

At least as far as the almost 70 participants in The Art of the Interview workshop in Cebu City were concerned, they did all those things, giving lawyer Gloria E. Ramos a challenging hourlong interaction.

An advocate for human, women’s and children’s rights as well as environmental protection, Ramos very generously agreed to allow the kids to practice their newly learned interview skills.

She was pleasantly surprised at the breadth and depth of the students’ curiosity, as they threw questions at her, ranging from her choice of career path to the quality of Philippine environmental laws.

The kids, mostly from private schools in Cebu, participated in the third of the Inquirer in Education (IIE) series of workshops on conducting interviews to help them prepare for the global My Dream Interview (MDI) competition that will give them the chance to win a trip to Madrid, Spain.

The workshops, conducted earlier at the Inquirer head office in Makati City and the University of the Philippines Baguio campus, discussed how to prepare for and conduct actual interview, as well as what to do after the interview.

They also apprised the kids of the requirements and other details relating to the MDI contest organized by the World Association of Newspapers and News-Ifra (WAN-Ifra).

With only a few minutes to prepare for their face-to-face encounter with Ramos, a columnist of the Inquirer sister publication Cebu Daily News, it was obvious from the questions asked that the students read very carefully the short background information on the interviewee handed out to them. One of the first questions thrown at Ramos was why she decided to shift from being a corporate lawyer to environment advocate. Ramos replied she was inspired by pioneering Filipino environment lawyer Antonio Oposa, a Ramon Magsaysay Award winner, to take up the cause.

That they were listening was apparent when the lawyer, after talking about the Philippines’ world-class environment legislation, was asked if there was any law she would want to see changed or repealed. To this very insightful question, Ramos said they had been working to amend the law creating the Department of Environment and Natural Resources because it gives the government agency “inconsistent roles—protecting the environment and exploiting the country’s natural resources” as a source of revenues for the government.

Ramos said environmentalists wanted the Philippines to have something similar to the United States’ Environment Protection Agency (EPA), an independent and powerful body with police powers.

The kids also showed they knew current issues and what was going on in other parts of the country as they asked the interviewee about the alleged cutting of pine trees by the giant SM retail chain. Ramos said the issue was of major concern to Baguio residents because the “SM area is the only remaining greenbelt area” in the city.

She added, however, that the publicity resulting from the issue had the positive effect of awakening the city’s residents. The lawyer pointed out that under the Philippine Constitution, every citizen “has the right to participate in activities” that would affect them.

Giving her young audience most-welcome lessons in civics, particularly good citizenship, she added the Constitution also guaranteed every Filipino’s right to a clean and healthy environment and that, under the local environment code, the people should be consulted before any action that would impact the environment was taken.

Like the other interviewees in the two previous workshops, Ramos clearly found the rare chance to interact with young people a very rewarding and exhilarating experience.