Rebuilding communities against corruption

My baptism of fire in public interest lawyering was a lesson in community empowerment. I was defending a group of farmers in southern Cebu sometime in 2011. At first, it looked like an ordinary case where my task as a lawyer was to prove facts and argue defenses in court. But my immersion with the farmers made me understand the social context that lay beneath the dispute.

- Atty. Ian Vincent Manticajon [e-mail]

I came to realize that the real battle was not confined to court processes but extended to strengthening the community’s advocacy for better land rights and social justice. By engaging directly with the farmers, I saw how our laws interact with lived realities.

It helped that the farmers were already organized, and it made me realize that an empowered community is never helpless. By ‘empowered’, I mean they are well-organized, they know their rights, they know how to assert them, and that they can depend on each other. In February 2014, perhaps as a result of that experience, I received a Tatak UP Award for Community Empowerment.

That experience made me realize that advocacies within an empowered community guarantee not only meaningful outcomes but also everyone’s safety and sense of security. Before accepting any active or prominent leadership role in the community, for example, I would prefer to first work toward its empowerment. That is because a disempowered community is a recipe either for one’s own evolution into a ruling elite, or for one’s downfall as a hero succumbing to the darker elements of society.