“You are doing a disservice to UP.” Former Student Regent Marco delos Reyes was stunned, finding himself at the receiving end of UP President Emerlinda Roman’s irate pronouncement – even before he could open his mouth.
                                        
The clamor for a new UP Charter has once again revealed the contending interests of the administration and the UP community regarding the trajectory of the 100-year old institution.

Unbeknownst perhaps to most students, the Senate has passed its version of the UP Charter bill, under Senate Bill (SB) 1964 or “An Act to Strenghthen UP as the National University,” on December 19 last year. It is now set to be reconciled with the House version in a bicameral conference scheduled as soon as sessions open on January 28.

The legislative process of the UP Charter bill is one that has been highly disputed by critics, composed mainly of student and faculty formations, of the administration-proposed bill. SB 1964 is the revived version of SB 2587, authored by Senator Francisco Pangilinan, which was shelved due to the intense opposition of students. SB 2587 practically legalizes all commercial ventures projected by the administration in order to augment UP’s dwindling budget.  

Opposition, this time, has evolved from mere stalling and junking to proposing alternatives through House Bill 2845 or “An Act to Strengthen UP as the National State University,” which mainly included proposals forwarded by the UP-Wide Democratization Movement (WIDEM) 3. The said alliance was formed by student and faculty institutions committed to ensuring democratic access to UP education and participation in its policy-making bodies.    

The events that took place on December 19 within the session hall of the Senate, however, showed the obstinacy of the Roman administration in finally subjecting UP to the whims of commercial enterprises and finally relenting to the debilitating government agenda of drastically cutting state support to tertiary education.

Before the final version was passed, Senator Jamby Madrigal stalled the proceedings since most senators have not yet received a copy of the committee report. The report should have encapsulated the consultations with students and faculty supposedly conducted by Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano.

As it turned out, Cayetano was not really interested in integrating the results of the consultation with SB 1964. The consultation was nothing but a ploy, a futile exercise since it merely accomplished the prerequisites for the final deliberations on the UP Charter. Pangilinan, with Roman and other UP officials on the sidelines, attempted to railroad the process in order to come up with a senate version of the bill “untainted” by the proposals of UP WIDEM 3.  

The maneuverings of the UP administration are reminiscent of their cowardly conduct during their deliberations on the UP tuition hike. Like the tuition increase, Roman and her host of administrators pursued the passage of the UP Charter when expected opposition would be minimal, that is, right after the suspension of classes for the holiday break. If vigilant students and professors were absent in the Senate proceedings, the administration would have had its way, passing their version of the UP Charter Bill without the input of key sectors in the university.

We recognize the need to come up with a new UP Charter especially since the university is currently celebrating its centenary. The current charter, after all, is a product of American colonialism, designating the university as the training ground for bureaucrats and technocrats accountable only to the American colonial regime. The history of the university, however, showed how UP was retrieved from its colonial vestiges and transformed into a potent site for fervent nationalism – geared towards serving the people for which the university should exist.

The bill generally pushes the university to abandon its commitment to serve the people, as it retains the old structure of the Board of Regents (BOR), UP’s highest governing and policy-making body, making it still susceptible to Malacanang intervention. It also enables the BOR to grant land leases to private entities and fix school fees when it deems necessary. Without the intervention of the student and faculty representatives present during the hearings, no safeguards would have been set. Among these safeguards were clauses that indicate that land grants should be consistent with UP’s academic mission and due consultations be conducted before raising school fees.      

Roman, ironically, should be the first to understand the necessity for collective policy-making. It was the UP community, after all, who hindered the near-appointment of a Malacanang bet as UP President in 2004. However, she has turned into the very adversary that she contended with during the 2004 UP President selection. It is also the esoteric hold of the BOR to UP’s policy-making processes that spurred the aberration which is the 300 percent tuition hike in a supposedly state university.

We are not against change. We are against retrogressive policies posing as ushers of change. Even if it takes another 100 years, we will stalk every iniquitous propositions like the most hardened assassins. 

Anything short of this is disservice not only to the university, but also to the people.#Philippine Collegian

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