Why zero in on a UP professor over SSS

I have also lived in many gated subdivisions (even those in upper class villages) which do not remit SSS contributions and other mandated payments to state funds, yet no one lifts a finger to arrest the officers and board members for such violations.

Yet yesterday I saw that the Quezon City police entered the UP campus—in violation of existing statutes with the Department of Interior and Local Government and PNP itself about not having policemen inside the state campus—arrest a professor for not remitting the SSS contribution of her maid, which only days before they talked about.

Easily, that move was meant and could be taken to mean simple harassment of the academic community, particularly the state university known for its critical thinking professors and students, to remind them of the powers of the state to silence them.

Dr. Melania Flores was a former union head of the All UP Academic Employees Union and a faculty member of the Department of Filipino and Philippine Literature, who was served a warrant of arrest in September but she was not around so police, posing as members of the Department of Social Welfare and Development to help her just took her physically on February 6.

The alleged kasambahay who reported the non-remittance of SSS contributions even saw her Sunday and nothing about her complaint or impending arrest was ever mentioned.

The union group noted that the involved house helper was with Flores’ family last weekend and did not mention any complaints on that matter. She was brought to Camp Karingal shortly after the incident.

AlterMidya said the warrant was issued to Flores last Sept. 6 by the Quezon City Regional Trial Court but did not receive any notice, complaint, or subpoena prior to the apprehension.

Several teacher’s rights groups and university organizations promptly expressed their concern and conducted protests condemning Flores’ arrest as a “violation of UP-Department of the Interior and Local Government Accord of 1992.” The Accord has prohibited the unauthorized entry of PNP to UP campuses.

Carl Marc Ramota from the UP Office of the Faculty Regent said in a statement that it did not only violate the UP-DILG Accord but as well as Flores’ Miranda rights.

There was no prior coordination with Diliman authorities on the planned operation, he added.

Ramota noted that this event and the recent Cebu abduction incident proved the need for the “institutionalization of a mechanism for monitoring and quick response against rights violations.”

The Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT)-Philippines, in a Facebook post, also stated that Flores’ arrest was an “abominable attack by state security forces against teacher and union leader Professor Flores to harass and intimidate her and violate her basic rights.”

“We demand the immediate release of Prof. Melania Flores from detention! We demand accountability for the gross violations of the CIDG-PNP on the rights of Prof. Flores and on the UP-DILG Accord,” it added.

Flores is a faculty member of the Department of Filipino and Philippine Literature at UP Diliman.

She recently finished her term as AUPAEU president last Feb. 3 and is also a National Council member of ACT.

Plainclothesmen from the Quezon City Police District (QCPD) arrested University of the Philippines (UP) professor Melania Flores at her residence inside the campus at 11 a.m. on Monday.

For that alleged violation, QCPD named Flores its “most wanted person” and sought a warrant last September from Judge Maria Gilda Loja-Pangilinan of Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 230.

Flores was taken to the Quezon City police office in Camp Karingal, where protesters gathered calling for her release.

Loja-Pangilinan set the bail at P72,000. The professor was released by 5:20 p.m., according to the UP Office of the Faculty Regent (OFR).

She was escorted by Faculty Regent Carl Marc Ramota, UP Diliman Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo, and Rommel Rodriguez, also a faculty member and vice president of All-UP Academic Employees Union.

1992 accord

Both the university administration and Barangay UP Campus confirmed that there was no prior coordination with them before Flores’ arrest.

The union, which she used to head, said her arrest violated a 1992 accord between UP and the DILG, which obliges the police to coordinate with the university’s administration before conducting any operations on campus.

UP has a separate accord with the Department of National Defense from 1989, which restricts military access within campus grounds.

According to union member Mary Grace Concepcion, Flores was not aware of any case against her regarding SSS remittances.

She added that the professor, on Sunday, talked to her housemaid and settled an issue relating to the latter’s SSS contribution.

“[This is] very disturbing and alarming because it’s an assault on academic freedom, especially to those who are known [to be] critical of the [administrations of Rodrigo] Duterte and [Ferdinand Marcos Jr.]. Especially since our job as educators is to exercise critical thinking,” Concepcion said.

“This can happen to anyone who is working in the academe. We should be vigilant and ensure that these things do not happen again,” she added.

Besides noting that Flores’ arrest violated the accord, the union, in its statement, said “this dirty tactic of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group is a means to threaten and harass leader-unionists and patriotic academic workers.”

‘Intimidation, threats’

The University Student Council posted a statement on social media urging UP students to condemn the arrest.

“We call on the UP students to condemn this deceitful arrest of Prof. Flores,… along with our continuous struggle for academic freedom and campus safety,” the council said.

Meanwhile, the OFR wants an investigation into what it called the “serious” protocol lapses surrounding the arrest.

“The Faculty Regent urged the University to use its full administrative and legal machinery to uphold and protect its constituency from intrusion and keep its campuses a safe haven for political thought and action,” the office said in a statement.

The Congress of Teachers/Educators for Nationalism and Democracy-UP (Contend-UP) said Flores’ arrest is the latest in a “series of intimidation and threats” against UP academics, including the reported abduction last month of UP Cebu lecturer Armand Dayoha and of Dyan Gumanao, a graduate of the university.

“The arrest of Ma’am Melania is part of the successive attacks on educators and progressive individuals who continue to fight for the rights of teachers and unionists,” said Pat Jasmin, a member of Contend-UP.

The Alliance of Concerned Teachers denounced the way Flores was apprehended, following reports that the plainclothesmen pretended to be workers from the Department of Social Welfare and Development handing out leaflets.

“This is a vile attack by the state security forces against the teacher-unionist leader to harass, intimidate and violate the rights of Prof. Flores,” the group said, adding that there was no sufficient explanation about the basis for the professor’s arrest.

My take

The message is crystal clear, this administration would not take any attacks sitting down. It would rather operate in an atmosphere where its constituents are silent as lambs. Chilling. Are we under Martial Law now. Have we suspended our Constitutional rights. As far as I can recall, the Supreme Court and the legislative have not concurred with any moves to suspend our rights and privileges. Is this what the confidential and intelligence funds are being used for? To make a hit list of those to be targeted because they are noisy against his administration.