Mabini Hall - Access to Justice

Normally, we hear of medical missions, food missions and in general humanitarian ones. Medical missions range from tooth extraction to cataract removal or similar types of out-patient procedure. Food missions include grocery baskets, sacks of rise and instant noodles. Relief goods cover old clothes to specific requests for tents or cement. But legal missions?

Over at a brainstorming session with colleagues, we observed that perhaps all these missions are of limited duration and effect. They surely answer the most basic and urgent needs of our fellowmen especially when disasters strike. In the course of dialogue with the recipients, it came to fore that the root of their problems is legal. The unanswered cry for justice and redress for their grievances cause them to get sick and for hair to fall off. Legal missions were conceived to get to the bottom of things, so to speak, to strike at the core of the grinding paghihirap with all its outward symptoms.

A legal mission simply is a group of lawyers coming from diverse backgrounds and disciplines that go to a community for a day to render legal advice, review documents and chart a course of action. There would be corporate, family, and criminal lawyers united by the common theme of lawyering for the voiceless.

An essential component is the coordination between the demand for legal services from the people and the supply of legal practitioners – to match and meet the skills and competency with the queries and complaints. The usual cases involve real property, civil service documents, family and spousal disputes. Some weirder ones include questions on extradition (in a murder case) and recourse for a carabao, on loan, killed by lightning. Strange and funny at times to some of us but no doubt, their lives revolve around their peaceful and speedy resolution.

The most recent one was held at the Sta. Perpetua Church, Manresa, Quezon City through the efforts of Father Daniel, Regnum Christi coordinator and Father Bong, the parish priest. They and the active pastoral group did the marketing plan for parishioners to come forth with their concerns one Saturday over two sessions, morning and afternoon. A typical legal mission can handle from 30 to 50 cases. The time spent for each case can last as short as ten minutes to an hour maximum depends on the complexity of the matter.

Paralegals and law students assisted and took notes. They participated in some discussions and contributed their youthful presence and clear optimism for the rule of law. A priest was also available to hear confessions for a holistic approach.

By the nature of the legal proceedings, some advice is limited in application for a one-day mission. Unlike medical ones which can treat physical conditions in one day, legal missions require generally a longer time frame to treat psychological, emotional, moral and social issues.

The lawyers that day are called legal missionaries which is what the lawyer’s oath is really all about. We think we are reaching out. Many of the cases handled do not even require a legal mind - only a dose of common sense. Most of them just want someone to talk to voice out their frustrations and to listen, really listen. That is perhaps the least we can do today in a world occupied with everything else except concern for others. We realize that, at the end of the day, we are actually helping ourselves. We are enriched by the encounters with seemingly problematic people; we gain a different perspective and remember that sometime past, we studied, work and dreamt of a place where people lived together, trusted each other and strode towards a confident future with interlocking arms. Let legal missions point the way.

If you’re interested in doing a legal mission either as a volunteer or coordinator, please email the author at geronimo.sy@gmail.com.