16/08/2026
WHO HOLDS THE PEN?
“We must defend academic freedom. Kailangan nang ipasa ang House Bill No. 9622…”
Those were the words of Kabataan Party-list Representative Renee Co as she called for the passage of the proposed Safe Schools and Universities Bill following her visit to Kalinga.
And when I read them, one question immediately came to mind:
Why?
Why is there such a strong desire to keep the AFP and PNP away from or place greater restrictions on their presence inside the very schools where our young people are being taught what to believe, what to question, and sometimes, what to fight for?
Perhaps that question sounds suspicious. Before I became a soldier, I was a campus journalist.
I was an editor of our school publication in Kalinga, and summer journalism workshops were among the experiences that shaped me as a young writer.
We would meet youth leaders and student journalists coming from the lowlands. To us, they were impressive.
They were articulate.
Confident.
Passionate.
They seemed to understand the country in ways we young students from the mountains were only beginning to discover. And they introduced us to something beautiful:
Malayang pamamahayag.
Freedom of expression.
The courage to question authority.
The responsibility of journalists to expose injustice.
The power of young people to become voices for those who could not speak for themselves.
And then they told us:
“The pen is mightier than the sword.”
Imagine hearing that when you are a young writer who has only recently discovered that her words can matter. It was intoxicating. Everything they said felt like an eye-opener. They made us feel empowered.
They made me believe that my voice could be amplified. That through freedom of speech, a young girl from Kalinga could be heard beyond her mountains.
That my pen could influence people.
That words could move communities.
That perhaps words could even move mountains.
And I loved it.
I loved them.
I wanted to become like them.
That was also when activism began to take a different shape in my young mind. It became beautiful.
An activist, to me, was no longer simply someone marching in the streets. An activist was courageous.
Intelligent. Principled. Someone willing to stand against injustice.
A “kabataang may ipinaglalaban at pag-asa ng bayan.”
Something inside me ignited.And eventually, I started dreaming of becoming part of Anakbayan.
Yes.
That was once my dream.
My innocent and naïve mind believed that this was where I could make a difference. I thought that if I became an Iskolar ng Bayan, I would be one step closer to becoming part of the movement that these young people had made so admirable in my eyes.
So I took the entrance examination. I passed. I thought I already knew where my life was headed.
But life has a strange way of changing destinations.
My mother had cancer. Plans changed. And eventually, I still became an Iskolar ng Bayan,
just in a place I never imagined myself entering.
The Philippine Military Academy.
The moment I entered PMA, the ideas planted in my head did not magically disappear. They stayed.
There were times when my body was already wearing the cadet uniform, but my mind was still fighting its own battle.
I had already been given a certain lens through which I looked at authority, government, inequality, oppression and activism. And suddenly, I found myself inside one of the very institutions I had learned to question. That internal struggle taught me something I would understand only much later:
Ideas do not need guns to become powerful.
Sometimes they only need a young mind willing to listen. Thankfully, PMA did not merely train me. It educated me. It gave me another perspective.
It taught me honor, duty, discipline, responsibility and service.
But perhaps most importantly for the writer in me, it taught me to listen to the other side.
I learned that caring for the marginalized does not require hating institutions.
That patriotism is not blind obedience.
And that having a voice is not enough.
You must first make sure that the voice coming out of your mouth is truly yours.
I never stopped being a writer. I simply learned how to give my voice the right tone.
Years later, when I was already an officer, I shared an observation with a senior officer.
I told him:
“Sir, Perhaps one reason recruitment into the communist insurgency remains effective is because sometimes we look for the beginning in the wrong place. That was not how ideological influence reached me. For me,
it started in school.
It came through youth activities.
It came through journalism.
And it came wrapped in beautiful democratic language.
Malayang pamamahayag.
Freedom of expression.
Justice.
Equality.
Oppression.
The power of the youth.
The responsibility to become kabataang pag-asa ng bayan.
No one handed me a gun.
They handed me an idea.
And for an idealistic young writer, sometimes an idea is more powerful.
This is why campus journalists and student leaders must be protected, not from ideas, but from being denied the opportunity to examine all sides of them.
They are natural influencers. They are articulate.
They question. They lead. They already know how to communicate.
And most importantly, many of them carry something incredibly precious: a heart burning to make a difference. You do not need to create that fire. It is already there. You only have to convince the young person what that fire should burn for.
I know. Because I was one.
And now I return to House Bill No. 9622. I understand the argument for academic freedom. I believe in academic freedom. I believe students must be protected from intimidation and undue interference.
But my own experience forces me to ask:
Who protects the student from ideological influence disguised as the only acceptable version of freedom?
If we worry that the presence of a soldier can influence a young mind, shouldn’t we also recognize that an articulate political organizer can influence that same young mind?
If AFP personnel entering a university deserve scrutiny, shouldn’t people entering schools to advocate political and ideological positions be open to scrutiny as well?
Why should one influence automatically be called intimidation while another is automatically called freedom?
Let me be clear.
Not every progressive student organization recruits for the armed movement. Criticism of government is not rebellion. Dissent is not terrorism. And questioning the AFP does not make anyone an enemy of the State.
But those principles must work both ways.
Because academic freedom should not mean:
Keep one perspective outside the gate while allowing another to shape young minds unquestioned inside it.
Academic freedom belongs neither to the AFP nor to the activist.
Neither to the Left nor to the Right.
It belongs to the student.
Let the AFP speak. Then question us.
Let activists speak. Then question them.
Let journalists speak.
Let professors speak.
Let history speak from all its uncomfortable sides.
Because schools should not manufacture obedient citizens. Schools should produce thinkers.
And perhaps this is why Rep. Co’s call for House Bill No. 9622 brought me back to a journalism workshop in Kalinga many years ago.
Because once upon a time, someone else held the pen before me. They taught me that it was powerful.
They were right.
The pen is mightier than the sword.
I would eventually carry both.
And carrying both taught me something my younger self could never have understood.
A sword can wound a body.
A pen can shape a mind.
A sword can win a battle.
A pen can influence a generation.
And today, that metaphor becomes even more meaningful.
Because the pen is no longer merely writing a campus editorial.
The pen is now writing legislation.
House Bill No. 9622 will be debated, examined and decided through our democratic institutions. It deserves to be read carefully, not simply because of who supports or opposes it, but because laws affecting the spaces where our children learn deserve the highest scrutiny.
What safeguards does it contain? Whose rights does it protect? What legitimate activities could it restrict?
How might it be interpreted years from now by people who are not even in office today?
Those are questions citizens have every right to ask.
Because if there is one lesson my journey from campus journalist to soldier has taught me, it is this:
Never be afraid of the pen.
But never surrender your mind simply because the person holding it speaks beautifully about freedom.
To our young campus journalists:
Keep your idealism.
Keep your fire.
Question government.
Question the AFP.
Question the PNP.
Question people in power.
But please question the people teaching you to question us, too.
Do not write simply because someone tells you to lean Left. Do not write because someone tells you to lean Right.
Write what is right.
Because yes, the pen is mightier than the sword.
But after carrying both, I learned that perhaps the more important question has always been:
WHO HOLDS THE PEN?
And now that the pen can write not only stories, but laws that may shape the spaces where our children learn, speak and dream, we should all be paying attention to the hand holding it.
