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Acebedo, Caesar Leo

LLB

Observation Letter

Last Friday, September 15, 2017, my classmates and I went to Philippine Mediation
CenterMetropolitan Trial Court Unit (PMC-MeTC) to observe mediation proceedings as we
were tasked by our professor in Practicum class. Before we went to PMC-MeTC, I was
wondering what was it really to be in a mediation proceeding. Do we really need to have a
counsel that will assist us in such proceeding or we can go there by ourselves without the
assistance of counsel? Will the mediator be the one to craft up the agreement of the parties or
will he just facilitate the crafting of such agreement? These are some of the questions that
came to my mind prior to our observation of mediation proceedings at PMC-MeTC.

As what I have observed in this kind of proceeding, the presence of counsel is


unnecessary but the parties were given the discretion if they want to be assisted by counsel in
such a proceeding. From my personal point of view, I think that such process is inclined to the
purpose of the law so that the parties will be given much leeway to agree on the terms and
conditions of their agreement coming out from the mediation proceedings. The interference of
lawyers, although at some point necessary because of their legal knowledge, might still tamper
the will of the parties in such a proceeding if they will to represent them in the crafting of the
agreement. But, the presence of lawyers is necessary with regard to the legal matters that will
be discussed in the agreements of the parties because laymen are not knowledgeable on that
aspect.

In the mediation proper, the mediator, before proceeding to mediation, will first lecture
the parties as regards the mediation proceedings and will ask them if they know about the
nature of the mediation proceedings. Then after lecturing the parties, they will now proceed to
mediation. The stipulation of the agreements will be left solely to the discretion of the parties,
and mediator will just facilitate the crafting of the agreements. The mediator or his/her staff
will be the one to make the agreement in accordance to the wishes of the parties.

Another observation was that the absence of dividers among the mediators in the office
negates the confidential nature of a mediation proceeding. This was because when I entered
the office, the mediators were scattered all over the place and I can really hear what the other
parties were discussing. As what I can recommend, the mediators need to have their cubicles
separated or divided from the other mediators so that the other parties will not hear what they
are discussing.

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