The League of Filipino Students (LFS), arguably the country’s most well-known activist student organization, marks its 31st year today.
On its anniversary, the LFS’ clarion call to its members can also apply to all Filipino youth. The call may be deemed subversive by some, but perhaps mainly because it disrupts and challenges the passivity, cynicism and apathy that pervade society today. For this and its long history of making the young people realize their progressive roles in and out of campus, we say thank you to the LFS.
The LFS has come a long way since its inception in 1977, right in the middle of a very brutal and repressive dictatorship:
The LFS started in 1977 as the Alyansa ng mga Mag-aaral Laban sa Pagtaas ng Tuition Fee (Alliance of Students Against Tuition Fee Increase). It gathered the militant students and student organizations committed to the protection of the student’s democratic rights. The LFS played a crucial role in dismantling military presence in the campuses and in the restoration of student publications and student councils.
In 1982, the LFS formally declared itself as a national democratic mass organization committed to advance the national democratic aspirations of the people. Since then, the organization continued to progress and was able to expand to almost every region in the country.
During the late 80’s, grave errors brought a sharp decline to the quality and quantity of the LFS activists. Though they were still able to lead the students against the US military bases and other significant student campaigns, errors like reformism, insurrectionism and putschism nonetheless crippled the organization.
Thus, in the early 90’s, the call for rectification of past errors within the whole national democratic movement was heralded throughout the country. Serious activists of the LFS painstakingly studied the past experiences of the LFS, and from thereon, extracted the lessons crucial for the militant and vigilant pursuit of the rectification process. Since then, the LFS has achieved significant success in its ideological, political, organizational strength.
Armed with the lessons of the past, and the unwavering commitment to advance the national democratic aspirations of the Filipino people, the League of Filipino Students (LFS), together with the Filipino masses, will continue to struggle for true liberation and a democracy which will genuinely serve the Filipino masses.
Today, the LFS maintains its presence in campuses, even in high schools, and in schools abroad where there are young overseas Filipinos. They may suffer harassments, some get banned in schools, some even die in pursuit of nobler ends in arenas elsewhere — but the LFS as a whole perseveres in preaching and practicing nationalism and democracy.
Some say activism and militancy are now passe. Which is odd considering that we live at a time that demands more activism and more militancy to struggle for reforms, to fight for what is right on campus and in society at-large. There were a handful who claimed in the 1990′s the impending end of the LFS and its brand of student leadership — but the times have proven them wrong. Among these handful were former LFS members themselves who sowed chaos and intrigue inside the organization, in their crazy attempt to seize leadership and bring the LFS before the altar of the Establishment. These rabble-rousers failed and are now in the company of characters our entire nation detest to the core of our being. Meanwhile, the LFS endures, continues to be relevant and remains a reliable ally of students and other sectors of society who share with the LFS the common goal of national democracy.
LFS chapters and LFS members may thus be viewed as “torch-bearers of hope” amid the gloom and doom of our moribund society that is dying to be replaced by an order that is truly democratic, prosperous, just and peaceful.
tenks tonyo!