Story & photo By Alessandra Anonas
DESPITE misconceptions about young people getting involved in politics, many of them showed up at a conference on federalism. The BusinessMirror talked to two of the organizers of the forum on how they ended up leading FedUP, a youth organization focused on federalism.
One of them is Jan Emil Langomez, who is also associated with the Youth Reform Movement Ph, formerly known as Youth for Miriam.
So how did this start with FedUp?
The forum to Federalism” group. I found [their contact information] online and I contacted their head [lawyer] Raul Lambino. I attended the [group’s] first general assembly, which was around three months ago [July] in Intramuros. Some of us thought that we wanted to engage more with the youth and that’s how FedUP was formed.
FedUp is sort of a subsidiary organization of Conform to Federalism, except that its target is educating and empowering the youth…on federalism and constitution[al] reform.
A lot of people would mistake this [October forum] as Pro-federalism conference. What would you say about that?
It would look like a pro-federalism conference because of the guests we invited [who are] pro-federalism but, really, our target goal is how we polish the event. It’s usually non partisan.
The questions and issues that we raise, we’d like to keep [these] as objective as possible, so even if many of the participants disagree with our point, we don’t mind. The aim of FedUp is to find out what the youth thinks about federalism and, at the same time, also make sure that we educate them on what it, federalism, is about so they are able to make their own opinion if they are agreeable with or they are against constitutional reform.
So now that you’ve seen the effects of the conference, what can you say about their reaction?
It was wonderful. I honestly did not expect that they would be this excited about constitutional [reform], because the challenge about constitutional reform is that it’s a highly technical topic and is sometimes even controversial. And you know, I guess we live in that very advantageous point right now. Not all of us are super pro-supporters of the President, but we do recognize the fact that it helps a lot that the President is pro-constitutional reform and that he currently has this high approval rating and, at the same time, this relationship between federalism and the President’s support has allowed us to, at least, have this opportunity to educate others about federalism. Unlike before, when we talk about constitutional reform, the tendency is they tend to have this negative connotation or view about constitutional reform. Right now, there’s still that negative connotation but it’s more on the fact that it’s because a lot of people are still unaware of what federalism is. They’re also unaware of what constitutional reform is and we believe that if we educate them about these topics, they tend to have a more informed opinion.
So far, from what we’ve experienced, when they get a basic knowledge about federalism, they seem to be more open about the idea of shifting to a federal form of government. But we didn’t do so in a way that we forced them to support federalism. It was more of [based] on their own informed choice. I guess this is an interesting trend that when someone is informed about a certain topic, the tendency is that they are more open in supporting it and, so far, we still have a lot of work to do in educating the youth about federalism, constitutional reform and other topics.
What are your plans for other conferences? Do you have any events after this?
We are still finalizing the other workshops. We plan [to hold] similar workshops in Cebu and Davao. But we are also open to making conferences in colleges and schools. Part of the objectives of our first workshop on FedUP is to also create longer linkages in different youth organizations and universities so that we are able to expand the presence and that we’re able to provide more education on federalism to as many people as possible.
How would you advise the youth about taking on federalism in the future?
My advice is to be proactive with regard to constitutional reform, especially if next year when the government decides to tackle or debate about shifting to a federal government because it’s the youth, the millennial generation, who will be affected the most, whether good or bad, you don’t know. It’s our generation who will be the benefactors with regard to the change of the form of government.
In 10 to 20 years it will be our generation who will be running and managing this government. It’s a personal goal for our generation to make sure to participate in the discussions in any event related to constitutional reform and, if possible, we can have linkages with congressmen and have key influences if you can meet them up and talk about constitutional reform or send them some proposal, then that’d be great. Finding out about it in the Internet is nice but we have to go beyond the Internet and take action in real life.
If federalism is already set up, what do you think would be your ideal contribution?
My ideal contribution would be that, at the very least, when the plebiscite comes, the decision of our country on whether to shift to a federal government, I hope that our contribution is that when the youth decide to vote on it, they do so with an informed opinion and not just because it’s a trend but rather because they believe in it. That is the contribution that we are pursuing to make.