SUCs: Divert secret funds to raise our budgets, too
Faculty and student leaders of state universities and colleges (SUCs) are urging the government to realign the billions of pesos in confidential and intelligence funds (CIFs) budgeted for next year to improving higher education in the country. On Sept. 27, the House of Representatives approved the P5.768-trillion 2024 national budget, which includes a P100.882-billion appropriation for SUCs. The amount given to the SUCs was P6.155 billion, or 5.75 percent, lower than this year’s P107.0297-billion allocation. In a joint statement on Thursday, student, faculty and staff regents, student councils and publications, and faculty and employees’ unions of four SUCs called on the House and the Senate to restore the budget cut and even increase the higher education spending for next year. It noted that the maintenance and other operating expenses dipped while the capital outlay, which covers long-term development of facilities, equipment and other institutional investments, had the largest cut. “Excessive and unnecessary confidential and intelligence funds should be redirected to revamp our educational institutions in the sustaining efforts to recalibrate and provide long-term holistic learning to Filipino youth from all walks of life,” the statement said. The statement was signed by 11 teachers, school staff and students representing the University of the Philippines (UP), Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP), Philippine Normal University (PNU) and Eulogio “Amang” Rodriguez Institute of Science and Technology (Earist). At a press briefing, UP faculty regent Carl Marc Remota cited the “alarming trend” of budget cuts in the education sector while CIFs had been allocated to “questionable” projects and programs of the Marcos administration. He said many SUC teachers have no job security due to the lack of plantilla positions in the government. The lack of permanent teaching positions results in heavier workload for instructors, professors, including teaching assistants and fellows, he added. “We are one with the calls of the education sector: oppose the budget cut and ensure that the questionable funds in the form of CIFs are rechanneled to programs that need it the most,” Remota said. Trying to put some humor on the dire situation, he said the intelligence fund was still useful. “I hope this fund is really for the intelligence of the current and next generation of teachers, students and staff to further improve the condition of SUCs,” he said. Earist case At Earist in Manila, the approved budget for maintenance and operating expenses and personnel services amounted to around
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