APO PHILIPPINES

Lecture delivered at the Fourth APO (Alpha Phi Omega) Alumni Congress- Luzon leg held at the A. Venue Hotel on Makati Avenue in Makati City on 18 October 2008. Brother Maximo Edralin/Epsilon ’52, grandfather of the PR industry in the Philippines and PR Consultant for the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) talks about the value of PR for Alpha Phi Omega

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I am happy that I am able at last to establish a relationship with my beloved organization, the Alpha Phi Omega, thanks to the entreaties of our indefatigable APO advocate and convenor, Brother Ronnie Deveza. For while it is true that I am one of the organizers of the Epsilon Chapter at the University of the East way back in 1952, my association with APO in the ensuing 56 years has been sporadic and far between.

I remember our Epsilon reunion during martial law when the then Ambassador to Japan, Brother Noel Fernandez and I were the guests of honor. And of course, our big golden anniversary reunion in 2002 and the celebration of our 55th anniversary last year where, on both occasions, three surviving members showed up – Joe Crespo, Ogot Justiniano and myself. My first attendance at an alumni leasers gathering was at a party in August in honor of two outstanding members, General Segovia and Admiral Cortez, where I met many of you for the first time. I must have looked really old because I was introduced, endearly I must add, as a “collector’s item” and a “national treasure.” Be that as it may, and maybe because of that, I love APO and I am most happy to be with you today.

I have been asked to speak to you on The Value of Public Relations. In this the First APO Luzon Alumni Congress in order that, in the words of National President Mel Adriano, “we are able to tell the world who we are and what we stand for.”

There is a PR process

What I’d like to do, pursuant to your instructions, is to clarify what public relations is and what it can do and then go into what we call a PR process, which includes identifying our strengths and weaknesses, before zeroing in on specific things we may want to do to achieve the image and reputation that we desire.

Let me talk a little bit about public relations or PR as a profession because I know it is not that well understood. You often hear people say, in relation to a politician’s remark or revelation, “pang PR lang yan,” meaning that the revelation is not true, it is only meant to make the politician look good. And then, of course, you’ve heard of “fat envelopes” used by unscrupulous PR practitioners to bribe media to get their message across. There are shenanigans in our business and, unfortunately for us legitimate practitioners, it is their notoriety that sticks in the public mind. Sometimes we find ourselves asserting that PR is a respectable profession that is in the business of persuading, not bribing, media to agree with our point of view.

Let me cite a couple of examples to illustrate how PR works and how useful it can be to turn around negative situations.

I handled PR in Citibank for 23 years and one thing I did that I particularly liked was to turn around the elitist image of the bank. Elitist because at the time I was there you could not open an account unless you had 300,000 pesos or 10,000 U.S. dollars. The minimum deposit was a function of the lack of branches of foreign banks and there was nothing I could do about that. What I did was to undertake many projects over a period of several years – too detailed to explain here – that enabled our employees to feel at the end of the day that, while bank policy continued to make the rich richer, we were not turning our back to the poor in our midst. For example, I used P2 million of my PR budget to lend out to small entrepreneurs in Cebu in amounts of P5,000, P10,000 and P20,000 for them to start or expand a small business. And then, of course, I went to town to publicize what they were doing with the money. This was microfinance but nobody had thought of that word at that time in the 80’s.

One spectacular demonstration of the elaborate use of PR tools and techniques was the PR program that made possible the peaceful and orderly implementation of the 600 per cent increase in toll fees in the North Luzon Expressway. This monumental act of persuading a violent public was not easy. All transport groups and car owners were threatening mayhem, and even Malacanang doubted the reasonableness of the increase, but the Manila North Toll ways Corporation felt a 600 percent increase was the minimum it needed to recover its huge investment.

A massive PR communications program took months to carry out. It was essentially based on conclusions made by U.P. professors commissioned to conduct a factual study. The study convincingly showed that the new highway would result in (1) substantial reduction in gasoline consumption by all vehicles running at consistent speed on well-paved road, and (2) substantial economic benefits that will accrue to all the towns traversed by the highway. The highway opened on schedule without demonstrations and with Malacanang approval. In a word, PR works.

APO’S Principal Strength

PR defined is an organized effort to bring about a wholesome relationship between an organization and its publics in order to enhance its image and visibility. It is essentially communications but that is not all that PR does. PR involves the whole gamut of making sure that the organization is deserving of the image that we seek to project. Another definition of PR is that it is 90 per cent performance and 10 per cent telling people about it. What this implies is that APO must perform well and be perceived as such. This brings us to the process of determining what its strengths are. This is the first step in the development of a PR program.

APO’s principal strength, in my view, derives from its roots in the Scouting movement. The organizers are right in choosing the theme of this Congress, which is to remind us of our roots and our obligation to live by the ideals and objectives of the Scouting movement. It is good to emphasize this because I am not too sure that the chapters in the schools are as committed to these ideals as the alumni are. Unless the leaders themselves had had thorough immersion in Scouting in their time, I doubt that the members can learn much from them.

And yet I submit our association with Scouting is the characteristic of APO that sets it apart, in fact distinguishes it from all the other Greek letter societies. We are dedicated to the proper upbringing of the country’s youth, a service that our country urgently needs to wiggle out of its dubious reputation as one of the most corrupt in the world. The APO alumni must inspire the chapters to keep this identification alive in the minds of students applying for membership in APO. It must be absolutely clear that their qualifications include membership in the Scouting movement and that they continue to espouse the values beginning with a Scout being trustworthy.

The neophytes orientation should begin with the history of APO. APO, if you recall, came about when 18 adult Scouts met at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania in 1925 to form a fraternity mainly dedicated to service. APO was brought to the Philippines by an official of the Boy Scouts of America in 1950 and the Filipinos who caught on the idea were leaders of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines, including Guillermo Padolina and Godofredo Neric, who both became Chief Scout Executives. APO, therefore, is clearly rooted in Scouting.

Roy Tamani needs your help

I am aware of your active involvement in Rover Scouting. But there is a golden opportunity to make this involvement even more meaningful. The BSP is today in dire financial straits mainly because it is dependent on the schools for its membership of some 2.5 million boys. We got into trouble when the Department of Education issued a circular at the beginning of the school year suddenly prohibiting the collection of membership dues during enrollment. We expect a big drop in both membership and revenues as a result. At our last board meeting, we decided to revive community scouting and named one of you, Brother Roy Tamani, to chair a committee to pursue the difficult task of organizing scout units in the grassroots, enlisting the services of NGO’s like APO, business organizations and barangay leaders. Roy needs your full support here not only because community scouting is the way to go to expand the coverage of the movement but also because it will reinforce our commitment to Scouting.

What is APO’s Image?

The next step in the development of the PR program is a candid examination of our weaknesses. What exactly does the public know about APO? What is our image? When you say Alpha Phi Omega, what comes to mind immediately? It is important to know this so that if there are any downsides we can take steps to remedy the situation. The other organizations are easier to identify. Aquila Legis is identified with the death of Leni Villa and the shameless effort of some frat alumni to block the outcome of the investigation. When you say Sigma Rho and Upsilon, you tend to conjure the image of frat brothers competing for power in government. But what about Alpha Phi Omega? I will volunteer a guess, and correct me if I am wrong, but I think what people remember of the organization is that it is behind the Oblation Run or Fun Run that sets the girls giggling in the U.P. campus once a year. I don’t think this is the image that you want for APO but it will continue to be unless we do something spectacular to overwhelm it.

Another image of APO I am afraid is hazing. APO is part of the column of Amelia Ilagan in the September 10, 2007 issue of Business World, entitled “Passage to Brutality.” It is an enumeration of unsolved deaths of neophytes in the hands of their superiors in the fraternities. The author remembered the death of Marlon Villanueva in the hands of his APO tormenters in U.P. Los Banos in 2006. I know that a great organization like APO does not deserve to be judged on the basis of isolated horrible incidents like this but that is how the public mind works. But this is also the value of going through the PR process. PR suggests that we do something about the flaws in the organization so that we can present a consistent positive front. We cannot go on to undertake feel-good projects while our image remains in question.

This fairly recent involvement of APO in a hazing case is unfortunate because it comes despite the publication of an elaborate APO Pledge Program designed precisely to stop hazing and to guide the collegiate chapters in the recruitment and education of pledge members. And full 12 years after the passage in 1995 of Republic Act 8049 that prohibits hazing as a prerequisite to the admission of neophytes in fraternities, sororities and other organizations. I know because I have seen the document that APO took pains to prepare – a thick rule book that specifies exactly what the chapters are permitted to do to welcome the applicants. There is a set of mandatory categories of service that highlights the fact that the pledge members are getting into an organization that is committed to a life of service. The penalties for violation are frightening, including expulsion and charges in court punishable by long prison terms but these obviously did not deter the misguided fraternity people in U.P. Los Banos.

Do you get the drift?

The strict enforcement of the APO Pledge Program is a challenge to this Congress. I know this is difficult and laborious but imagine the consequences to our reputation if we can do it. We can go on record that APO has stopped hazing while others cannot because the Scout Law is our Code of Ethics. There lies the big difference.

I hope by now that you are getting the drift of what I am trying to say. We will still do the PR projects that you folks dream of doing like planting a million trees to mitigate global warming, get jobs for our new graduates, and adopt a park or town, but the best advocacy, in my humble view, is to stay on course by reaffirming our roots in Scouting. This is what you may call APO’s unique selling proposition and what we are going to do to flesh it out happens to be our country’s greatest need, helping to make sure our young people become responsible adults.

There is another development in the Boy Scouts of the Philippines where APO may choose to get involved. The BSP has signed a five-year contract with Coca-Cola to develop idle properties of the BSP all over the country into tree plantations as their contribution to the reduction of global warming. Coco-Cola is to sustain the seedlings until they can grow on their own, hence the five-year agreement. There is a Scouting program woven into the project for the boys. They can make a little money if they grow the seedling in their backyard and then sell the same to the BSP. They can also earn green merit badges as a result. On top of this project is a fellow you may know, J. Eduardo Delgado, who now runs Delbros. Jed, as we call him, is the son of the late Ambassador Antonio Delgado, who served as the first Asian to become Chairman of the World Scout Committee in Geneva.

In conclusion I would like to submit for your consideration these action plans for our Public Relations Program.

1. Write the history of APO and the significance of its roots in Scouting. There is a part of the APO Pledge Program that mandates this but I doubt that it has been done. I think the alumni should initiate compliance and make sure that it becomes the paper that should motivate every member.
2. Stop hazing in APO. The preparation of the rule book is just a beginning. Its enforcement needs a method that the alumni can provide so that it is taken to heart by every chapter.
3. Work with Brother Roy Tamani to make his mission in the Boy Scouts of the Philippines succeed. There are 110 BSP councils in the country. If the alumni can mobilize just one Rotary Club in every council to sponsor the uniform and fees of 40 boys, which is not that much, Roy will have 110 APO scout units by next year, God willing

This will reaffirm APO’s link to Scouting and make all the chapters believe it is true. This is the image, the reputation and the visibility that I recommend for Alpha Phi Omega.

Let us go on to the Visayas and Mindanao Congresses to sell this idea.
I thank you.