August 02 || The Visiting Forces Agreement

After talking about Pnoy's State of the Nation Address during the previous meeting, the class went on to discuss an important "treaty" that involves the Philippines and the United States. First, it was a fun challenge for me to read a 4-paged article about the visiting forces agreement or the VFA. Given a limited time of 10 minutes made me think and analyze things faster.;) The article that I got highlighted the flaws of the said agreement. It highlighted three main arguments which are very detrimental to the our national interest.

After reading the article given, the class discussion started with a question of "What then is VFA?". From my side, there was an outpouring number of negative definition and on the other side were the positive ones. I was expecting a little debate over the question but it seems that the other side of the class agrees with our definitions. VFA is indeed an agreement that allows the US to exploit our country and our citizens, at least for my interpretation. As the discussion went on, I've learned about the history of the agreement and the processes done before it was actually considered a "treaty" for the Philippines. It was of great disappointment actually for me to know that our public officials specifically the ones assigned to represent our country allowed such agreement to be enacted or implemented. As how I see it, it is totally pointless. I'm not saying that we should benefit more but I'm more of making it equal in terms of opportunities and benefits. As mentioned several times in the class discussion, in treaties, both parties should be equal. Reading the short article influenced me and convinced me that this agreement should not be honored and implemented in the country unless we decide to surrender ourselves to the Americans and become their slaves not remembering the struggle our nation had to go through to have independence. Not so perfect, right?

As for the powerpoint presentation, it consisted more of VFAs flaws than merits making it more difficult for our side to counter the arguments given in the article which is anti-VFA. Also, I have one pretty question. Is there really VFA I and II because it was mentioned in the discussion but was not tackled in detail.

That's it for this week's meeting. The meetings after midterms seem to be more interesting and enjoyable. :>