Hazing and the schools

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor GUILLERMO TEJIDA III Desk Editor PATRICK PANGILINAN Busines Editor NIDA A. BUENAFE Sports Editor RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

Only few days ago, the Supreme Court came out with a decision upholding the conviction of the fraternity members found guilty of beating their fellow student, a neophyte, to his death during the rites of initiation to their group.

In that case, Lenny Villa, a freshman law student at the Ateneo de Manila, died after undergoing the brutal rites of hazing that is supposed to qualify one for membership in a fraternity.

It took more than 20 years, with the case is going all the way through the lower courts to the highest court in the land, before the penalty of imprisonment was confirmed against those found to have participated in the torture of young Lenny Villa.

One would think that the Lenny Villa case, and so many others before it that had even led to the passage of the Anti-Hazing Law in the country, would put the fear of death, or at least imprisonment, in the minds of fraternities. Obviously, the law has not been taken seriously enough, because cases of fatal hazing still continue to crop up, most of them involving students of the most prestigious schools.

Only last Sunday, another case of a fatal outcome of an initiation was reported. This time it was another law student who died after going through the so-called “entrance test” to a fraternity. What is it about such law students that make them so brutish in treating those who want to become their “brothers”? Is that the way to treat those who wish to have fraternal ties with them?

Apparently the Anti-Hazing Law has not been effective in stopping these inhuman and immoral practice of college students. It also seems that school officials only look the other way even if it must be known to them that fraternities exist in their schools, and what their members do before accepting new ones.

Perhaps one way of dealing with the formation or existence of fraternities is to involve the institution and its officials in any crime that involves fraternities in their schools. As heads of such institutions, they certainly have responsibility for the actuations of their students. That way, they may be more cooperative in implementing the provisions of the law intended to protect the students in their care.*