SCRAP THE CPD LAW!

SCRAP THE CPD LAW (R. A. 10912)!

 

Republic Act 10912 (CPD Act of 2016) authored by former Senator Antonio Trillanes and implemented since July 1, 2017 has created problems for thousands of practicing engineers and other professionals who could not renew their licenses without going through tons of credit units of seminars, costing thousands of pesos. The process of renewing licenses becomes more bureaucratic and unnecessarily regulative. It’s repressive, to say the least, and very inconvenient and burdensome especially to freelance professionals.

After barely a year of implementation, complaints flooded online fora and social media. Later, two online surveys participated by nearly a quarter of a million professionals resulted in 92.6 percent agreed to abolish the CPD Law.

On October 11, 2018, Senator Ralph Recto filed SB No. 2073, seeking to repeal RA No. 10912. In Congress, HB No. 7171 was also filed by Party-list representatives seeking the same objective. Nearly two years have passed and both bills are still pending.

For three years, I have voiced my arguments against it in social media. I’ve asked that the law be reviewed and revised, if not repealed. Continuing Professional Development (CPD) seminars should be given only to newly graduates and professionals who failed to renew their license continuously, and it must be voluntary and not compulsory. New and current knowledge in almost all fields of endeavors are readily available in the Internet, hosted by established academic institutions.

Finally, today, July 27, 2020, President Rodrigo R. Duterte, in his fifth State of the Nation Address (SONA), asks Congress to amend or otherwise abolish this impractical law imposed upon licensed and practicing professionals.

“I call upon Congress to amend Republic Act 10912 or Continuing Professional Development Act of 2016. In this time of great pandemic and reconstruction, requiring our professionals to attend seminars is burdensome and not realistic. This must end!” Said President Duterte.

Indeed. Laws like R.A. 10912 created out of ignorance and lack professional inputs should not be allowed to continue to take effect.

In my field of engineering, specifically, civil and structural, if there is a law that should be formulated, it should be for the creation of engineering codes conforming to local conditions and standards, i.e. a Philippine Seismic Design Categories Manual, especially because our country is earthquake-prone. We need to have our own national standard based on local experiences and events applicable to prevailing factors and conditions. For this to happen, we need to do our own seismic engineering research, investigations, and model experiments. The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) started the science side of it through their publication of the Philippine Earthquake Model (PEM) Atlas. We need a similar counterpart in the engineering side.