From 18 to 22 March, Lawyers for Lawyers organized a Speaker Tour with Czarina, a human rights lawyer from the Philippines.
As part of the Speaker Tour, Czarina and Lawyers for Lawyers spoke to lawyers from the law firms Vondst Advocaten, Brinkhof N.V, Loyens en Loeff and with lawyers who are connected to the Young Bar Associations of Oost-Brabant.
Lawyers for Lawyers opened the presentations by informing the lawyers and students about the work of our organization. After that, Czarina reflected on the alarming situation of lawyers in the Philippines and provided valuable first-hand information from her own experiences as a human rights lawyer.
As part of her presentations Czarina highlighted the role of lawyers in the Filipino human rights movement by informing the audiences about the work of the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL) and the Union of Peoples’ Lawyers in Mindanao (UPLM). She also discussed the issue of red-tagging and how this practice affects the work of lawyers.
Czarina ended her presentations by answering the question: “What can we do together?”. She offered our audience the following ideas:
- Condemn the attacks against the legal profession;
- Support or initiate legal actions by engaging international mechanisms such as the UN or the EU Parliament to hold the Philippine government accountable for the human rights violations;
- Join Lawyers for Lawyers as a lawyer-volunteer;
- Contribute to raising public awareness on the human rights situation in the Philippines through
- articles, research, thesis papers, community immersions, and other means.
All presentations ended with lively Q&A sessions and the following closing remark: “Ang Tao, Ang Bayan, Ngayon ay Lumalaban!” which translates to “The People United will Never be Defeated!”.
Lawyers for Lawyers would like to thank Czarina for sharing her experience and all our partner law firms and Jonge Balies for listening to Czarina and our story.
