Pia backs UP law
professors facing SC sanctions
Press Release
November
12, 2010
PASAY CITY – Senator Pia S. Cayetano today threw her support solidly behind the 37
professors of the University of the Philippines (UP)
College of
Law
who have been threatened with sanctions by the Supreme Court (SC)
after they called for the resignation of a member of the high court
over charges of plagiarism.
“In the seventies and
eighties, it was the voice of activist professors who denounced the
excesses of Martial Law that helped keep people’s hopes alive for
change and reforms, especially among the youth. It saddens me to see
how academic dissent is being suppressed now, at a time when our
rights and freedoms have supposedly been restored,” said Cayetano, a
lawyer and alumna of the UP College of Law.
“As the last bastion
of justice, the SC is expected to set the highest standards of
integrity, credibility and professionalism. Unfortunately, the high
court failed in this respect when it allowed a clear case of
plagiarism within its ranks to go unpunished,” she stressed.
Cayetano is referring
to the SC’s controversial decision in Vinuya vs. Executive Secretary,
where several passages from eminent international legal scholars were
lifted without proper attribution and used inappropriately in junking
the petition of a group of war-time comfort women for the Philippine
government to compel Japan to make a public apology and provide
compensation.
“Plagiarism is a form
of dishonesty that is taboo and frowned upon in any self-respecting
institution. All our teachers, from grade school to college, have
instilled in us the value that lifting works from others without
properly acknowledging their source is improper, unethical, and merits
grave punishment. Our teachers taught us to be honest, original and
creative in our work. But I wonder what values will our young students
learn from the questionable actions of the Supreme Court?” she
concluded.
