Gender Law and Policy Program Opinion Receives Affirmation In a first for the fledgling Gender Law and Policy Program of the UP College of Law, the Insurance Commission affirmed GLPP’s position that LGBTQ members may designate beneficiaries of their choice in their insurance plan. Earlier Professor Leo Battad, program director of the Gender Law and Policy Program had sought the Commission’s “guidelines on the right of the insured to designate a beneficiary, particularly the rights of members of the LGBTQ community to designate their domestic partners as beneficiaries of their life insurance.” Affirming this position, the Commission issued a legal…

Primal Liberty vs Rule of Law: lawfare in times of democratic backsliding At a Forum on Lawfare: weaponizing the law against democratic dissent, leading civil liberties advocate Dr. Pacifico Agabin, former Dean of the UP College of Law, put in context the terms “lawfare”, “weaponizing the law” and the “rule of law”. Associating the former two with democratic backsliding, he averred that the latter term “should not be taken out of its overarching purpose to protect political speech or political dissent;” that it should be anchored on “the primal values of our Constitution.” Citing American judge Learned Hand, Dean Agabin…