In light of the recent incidents of alleged plagiarism, the
National Youth Commissioncalls on the youth to avoid plagiarism and to respect
Intellectual Property Rights (IPR).
“Even if a public official says that it is alright that he
copied from a source and failed to attribute, still, we would like to remind
young people, especially students, that plagiarism is wrong.” Undersecretary
Leon Flores III, Chairman of the National Youth Commission says.
Plagiarism is derived from the Latin word “plagiaries” or
kidnappers, referring to someone who steals other’s work. According to Oxford
Dictionary, plagiarism is the practice of taking someone else’s work or ideas
and passing them off as one’s own.
In the Philippines ,
the government ensures to protect and promote intellectual property rights
through several policies. These policies
were both in the 1973 Constitution which provides that “the exclusive right to
inventions, writings and artistic creations shall be secured to inventors,
authors, and artists for a limited period” and in the 1987 Constitution which
explicitly mandates that the State shall protect intellectual property.
“With seamless flow of information now provided especially
by the internet, it is important that proper attribution be made. We should
resist the temptation to copy-paste without attribution because that is still
tantamount to stealing. Call it by any other name, but stealing someone’s idea
through plagiarism is still stealing. Proper attribution is the difficult
right, plagiarism is the easy wrong."
Chairman Flores adds.
“Sometimes, even if
we do not have a law against something that is blatantly wrong, it still does
not make it right. In this case, we do have copyright regulations that are
clearly outlined in the Intellectual Property Rights Law. But nonetheless, the
lack of definition of plagiarism only means that the efforts of our legislative
institutions have been found inadequate in pushing for these mechanisms to prevent
stealing of ideas and information.”
The National Youth Commission, created in 1995 pursuant to
Republic Act 8044 otherwise known as the "Youth in Nation-Building
Act", is the voice and advocate of the youth. It operates under the Office
of the President of the Philippines
as the policy-making, coordinating body of all youth-related institutions,
programs, projects, and activities of the government.
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