Palace tells SUCs: Basic education first

MANILA, Philippines – Malacañang yesterday told students of state universities and colleges protesting budget cuts that the government will focus first on basic education and that SUCs have sufficient funds.

President Aquino’s spokesman, lawyer Edwin Lacierda, also asked officials of the University of the Philippines (UP) to disclose where its P11-billion fund went when the money was never returned to the National Treasury.

Lacierda – who took his pre-law at the De La Salle University and earned his law degree at the Ateneo de Manila University – also suggested that instead of all these rallies, university officials should do some explaining to their students.

“I think for purposes of better communication and dialogue, I think it will be good for the university officials to explain. SUCs have money. They are not neglected. It’s just that at this time, our greater concern is basic education,” he said.

Lacierda said the budget for education has in fact been increased from P21 billion this year to P23 billion in 2011, although the capital outlay and maintenance and operating expenses have been deleted.

Statistics show that out of 100 high school students, only 14 reach and graduate from college. Most of those who graduate come from affluent families, not from the impoverished sectors of society.

Lacierda said the government allowed the SUCs to retain their income, totaling P19 billion, P11 billion of which was earned by UP. “With respect to the SUCs, you’ve got your income. Use it. Don’t come to us. Spread that goodwill among your students. Whatever you want to develop in the university. Don’t keep it to yourself. Put it in a bank account. That’s what we’ve been trying to tell them,” he said.

He said UP, particularly its Diliman campus, has assets such as unused land that its officials have the “discretion to develop and use” for the “betterment of the education of students.”

Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III said the students “got it all wrong” because the subsidy for SUCs under the P1.645-trillion national budget for 2011 was not reduced but actually increased.

Senate finance committee chairman Franklin Drilon said the 2010 budget passed by Congress contained a P22.4-billion appropriation for SUCs, but P2.8 billion of this were congressional insertions that were later disallowed by then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Drilon said the proposed appropriation of P21.7 billion for SUCs in 2011, as submitted by Malacañang, was actually an increase of P2.1 billion from the previous year’s figure. The House of Representatives’ version of the 2011 budget showed an P8-million increase on the President’s proposed subsidy for the SUCs. Drilon said the Senate’s version is likely to carry yet another increase, as well as additional funds for UP.

Senate Minority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano said the SUCs’ budget must be increased because they cannot be self-sustaining, as argued by the Aquino administration.

“Even UP said their internally generated funds are only 30 percent of what is needed, in spite of the fact that they have large tracts of land and partners in generating funds,” he said. –-Delon Porcalla (The Philippine Star)
with Marvin Sy