Patricia Ann M.

Cruz
11287187
Practice Court I – GO2
Atty. Milagros Cristobal

Re: Legal Aid and Development by Jose W. Diokno

The article was a poignant, candid and almost literary piece

written by one of the most distinguished Philippine senators, human
rights lawyer, and founder of the Free Legal Assistance Group
(FLAG), Jose “Pepe” Diokno. He was often remembered with a
statement that he once uttered after the Jabidah massacre; he called
out the Marcos administration and said, “no cause is more worthy
than the cause of human rights... they are what makes a man human.
Deny them and you deny man's humanity.” The article discussed one
of the ways in which he sought to advocate human rights in the
country.

Senator Diokno first discusses the meaning of “traditional”

legal aid, and as the article progresses, he breaks down the piece-by-
piece definition of what an effective and useful legal aid truly means.
He says that legal aid has traditionally viewed its function as providing
legal solutions to legal problems of the poor by vindicating their legal rights.
He says that its thrust is to uphold the law, not to transform society –
the latter, is what he thinks should be the main purpose of legal aid.
Traditional legal aid, according to Senator Diokno, is the lawyer’s
way of giving alms to the poor. And I believe that this type of legal
aid is still extant today. Politicians, although not necessarily lawyers,
are often the perpetrators of this social ill. It can be seen from their
programs that what they give to the poor are temporary reliefs by
giving them packed lunches and money that can last them for a
month or two.

As a fourth year student of the law, I have encountered and

have been guilty of doing “traditional” legal aid. I often feel that
since I am part of the privileged class of society, I am compelled to
extend my arms and feet to the underprivileged; that having the
opportunity to read the books, I should teach those whom I deem to
be less fortunate individuals, things that they don’t know about; that
being a student of a human rights-centered school means I should be
my own version of Mother Theresa or Pope Francis, in a lawyerly
fashion. I realize that this is a big problem because teaching them
what they don’t know does not necessarily solve the essential things
– poverty, hunger and injustice. I might be helping these people not
to be ignorant as to what the law is, but long as I don’t teach them
what it means by having to fight for their rights and stand on their
own feet, change will not arise; society will still remain the same. If
we were to follow the traditional view, it will merely provide
temporary relief to the poor and will not help them become self-
reliant and responsible citizens.

Immersing myself in the Developmental Legal Aid Clinic of the

De La Salle University – College of Law (DLAC) has made me realize
a lot of things about the law that weren’t taught in class, I simply
experienced them myself. For instance, a client who was a victim of
illegal recruitment was not treated as such by the law, and was not
recompensed by her employer simply because she was misled into
signing another contract with the principal which in effect,
extinguished her agency’s liability as opposed to what the law
provides. In the end, she was not able to run neither after her
principal nor after her agent. If I were to exercise “traditional” legal
aid in helping her, I would have just simply fixed the problem in the
best way I could, file charges (criminal and administrative) against
the employer, which I did. But if I were to follow what Senator
Diokno thinks as the progressive and more effective kind of legal aid,
I would teach her the basics of signing a contract with a foreign
principal and local agent, its legal effects as to her rights and
liabilities, and the possible consequences, which I tried my best to do.
I know for a fact that this has not helped my client to get the money
claim that she wanted and deserved, but she sure felt a sense of
triumph when I filed the administrative case, and she sure felt more
aware of the labor injustices in the society, when I taught her about
illegal recruitment.
 Legal aid should politicalise its traditional function. Legal aid lawyers
should determine whether their client’s legal difficulties are personal
problems or social problems. Lawyers should determine whether the
problems that their clients seek their advice for, are only specific to
the latter’s needs, or are actually applicable to a bigger community.
That way, the lawyer will be urged to involve their clients more in
solving their legal problems in order to prevent its possible repetition
in the future, and prevent it from ever coming to fore. This reminds
me of one of the legal seminars that I was a part of just last summer.
During the open forum, one of the attendees asked whether she is
qualified to the benefits of the Solo Parent Welfare’s Act. She acts as
the breadwinner of her family, albeit being the youngest of them, and
have treated her older sister’s daughter as her own. I answered in the
affirmative and asked whether there is a DSWD Desk in her barangay
where she can present her Solo Parent I.D. and avail of the law’s
benefits. Unfortunately, the barangay was not aware of such
provision in the law. I told the barangay captain to immediately set
up a desk and coordinate with the Deparment of Social Welfare and
Development since there happens to be a lot of qualified solo parents
as defined in the law within the area. The attendee was very open in
initiating the cause, which eventually benefited most of them.

Social awareness can be heightened if legal aid makes full use of its
educative function. The DLAC has taught us how to fully utilize the
educative facet of legal aid in all of our activities. For every legal
seminar or workshop, the students make sure that they not only
discuss important aspects of the law, but also engage in open forums
with the attendees, and provide them with materials, which can be of
use in the future. Our adviser specifically reminded us to teach the
law using our national language and use real-life examples to
illustrate it. This has been our mantra since as law students.

Legal aid lawyers must always be conscious that their role is purely
supportive. Although we are encouraged to take on cases and always
resolve them head on, we are also guided by the principle that what
we can only do for our clients in the DLAC is to merely suggest
solutions to their problems. And if they agree to the solutions that we
provide, then that is the time that we take action. If a person merely
seeks for advise, our job is to consult our books and cases, and
provide our clients possible options, which he/she can tackle. Legal
aid lawyers should not be the ones making decisions for their clients,
because as cliché as this may sound, lawyers are known for always
putting gas into the fire. If settlement is a more viable option, then a
legal aid lawyer should go for it.

Senator Diokno has enumerated several factors, which restrict

the effectiveness of legal aid. Fortunately, our society has evolved
and has long gotten out of the shackles of dictatorship. Our own
Constitution has provided everything we need to disable any form of
human rights violations. However, the “perennial problems of lack of
time, funds, and of manpower” still plague the development of legal
aid. Law schools in the country may have incorporated in their
respective curriculums the establishment of free legal aid clinics, but
lawyers who are actually doing free legal work for marginalized
people are considered a dying breed. With the prices of merchandise
rising, our country’s economy going downhill, I wonder if competent
lawyers would still think of other people’s problems and resolve it
effectively, without getting paid? I wonder if law students would do
take their legal aid work seriously if it weren’t for the grades that
they would like to maintain? These questions in my head made me
realize that while we still have lawyers, law students, and human
rights advocates, who are capable of doing legal work for the poor,
we should all act fast in teaching them, and aiding them as much as
we can so they won’t ever need us in the long run.