University of the Philippines holds press conference on U.P. Padayon Disaster Response Team deployment to Iligan City

U.P. President Alfredo E. Pascual during the press
conference held at Quezon Hall, U.P. Diliman

By Chanda Shahani

A multi-disciplinary team of experts from various units of the University of the Philippines (U.P.) and U.P. President Alfredo E. Pascual reported to the media today U.P.'s initial assessment of the devastation wrought by Typhoon Sendong in Iligan City. Typhoon Sendong hit Cagayan de Oro and the Iligan City areas last December 16 and 17, 2011.

"This is a good time to share what U.P. has done with respect to Mindanao. U.P. has a unique role because of its capability to provide a quick response to crises such as these as well as also provide longer term solutions to disaster risk reduction and management," he said.

President Pascual said he was in Hong Kong on December 16 and 17, attending the centennial celebrations of Hong Kong University when the disaster struck. He said he immediately instructed U.P. Vice President for Public Affairs J. Prospero de Vera, who is also a professor at the U.P. Diliman's National College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG) to immediately formulate a U.P. response to the disaster

From left to right: VP for Public Affairs Prospero de Vera,
President Alfredo E. Pascual, Prof. Mahar Lagmay and AVP
for Public Affairs Danilo Arao

Correspondingly, a multi-disciplinary team from U.P. units in Diliman and Manila was assembled for quick deployment to Iligan City last December 27 to 29, 2011, since it had become apparent to President Pascual that Cagayan de Oro was in better stead from relief efforts from other sectors, while Iligan City was comparatively just as devastated, but more neglected. V.P. de Vera was designated by President Pascual to head the U.P. Padayon Disaster Response Team.

President Pascual said U.P.'s choice of Iligan City for its intervention was based on its own assessment as well as with consultations with Senator Koko Pimentel, a U.P. Diliman graduate, whose family has strong roots in nearby Cagayan de Oro City.

The multi-disciplinary team was made up of four main components:

• A medical mission team from U.P. Manila - PGH and local volunteers. These were made up of pediatricians, community doctors, psychiatrists, emergency medical staff and nurses. 
• A public health team from U.P. Manila and U.P. Diliman, including public health experts and sanitary and civil engineers. 
• Geologists from the U.P. National Institute of Geological Sciences 
• A forensics team from U.P. Manila - PGH and the U.P. Diliman's National Sciences Research Institute Analysis Laboratory. 

All the four teams conducted quick ocular inspections of calamity sites in Iligan City as of December 29, 2011.

The teams will provide recommendations on Monday, January 2, 2012 to President Pascual, and these will be forwarded to the City of Iligan and also to Senator Koko Pimentel.

Vice President de Vera said that a lot of bodies in the area still needed to be unearthed. He said working arrangements had been made with Vice President Jejomar Binay and Makati City Mayor Junjun Binay for the City of Makati to send K-9 units for the detection of bodies. All that was needed was to make arrangements for the dogs to be transported, he said.

He also said that U.P. had partnered with Mindanao State University – Iligan Institute of Technology to collect rainfall data for U.P.'s computer simulations on the area.

Here is what the four teams essentially accomplished during their trip to Iligan:

Medical Mission Team from U.P. Manila

The team took care of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and health needs. The health team treated 1440 evacuees on December 28 at Barangay Digkilaan. Out of a population of 5,000 27 were listed as dead and 28 were missing. The most common medical problems were upper respiratory tract infections and gastro-intestinal disorders with several cases of PTSD. A total of PhP 400,000.00 worth of medication was brought to the site. In the press conference, the medical team was represented by Dr. Carlos Primero Gundran, a specialist in disaster medicine.

Public Health Team from UP Manila and UP Diliman

The Public Health Team consultations, led by U.P. Manila College of Public Health Professor Buenalyn Teresita Ramos-Mortel on December 28, 2011 occurred at the DOH-CHDNM Operation Center in Iligan City Hall, the Juan Actub Lluch Evac site with a population of 528 persons, the Ubaldo Laya Evac Site with a population of 1,299, the MSU - IIT Evac Site with a population of 1,030 as well as two additional evacuation sites.

The team observed varying levels of organization and a common need for continuous supply if drinking water, water for sanitation, food provisions and sanitation facilities. There were inadequate numbers of comfort rooms and waste bins and all sites were reliant on aid and donations.

Both teams were not yet ready with their full reports, Vice-President de Vera said, adding that they would be submitted on Monday, January 2, 2012.

Geologists from U.P. Diliman National Institute of Geological Sciences

The Geohazard Team was headed by Dr. Mahar Lagmay of the National Institute of Geological Sciences (NIGS) at U.P. Diliman The team's mission was to collect the geohazard data of devastated areas and also to check the viability of permanent relocated areas.

Dr. Lagmay said that the devastation in Iligan was worse than Cagayan de Oro (CDO). The impact was really visible in Iligan, he said A NASA TRMM satellite positioned showed that the storm warning of NASA was already spotted several days before it hit landfall in Mindanao. It peaked 20 kilometers from the clouds, indicating a heavy volume of water

Water measurements reached 142 mm on December 16 and 97 mm on December 17 as measured in the CDO airport with the rain peaking between 6 to 7 p.m. on December 16 and with floods between 11:30 p.m.to 1:30 a.m. on December 16 to 17.

CDO was hit with three times the water volume as the Marikina watershed during the devastating Typhoon Ondoy in 2009, Dr. Lagmay said.

Most of Iligan was impacted with high velocity floods. The Mandulog River itself accumulated water. The component villages or barangays of Santiago, Hinaplonan and Upper Hinaplunan which are all located in Iligan City were the most heavily hit, Dr.Lagmay said during the press conference

Dr. Lagmay said that the flood waters reached up to eight meters in height and were characterized by high velocity and carried logs, sand and mud. They were rampaging and were highly erosive, "like a tsunami," but with more debris. Even trees were ripped away from their foundations, he said.

Flood plains were part of the water system during extreme weather events, he said making them unsafe for human habitation

He said that illegal logging aggravated the flooding but the primary reason was that it was an extreme water deluge that was primarily responsible.

He called for a proper geohazard assessment of the area, adding that places like Santiago may not be inhabitable anymore.

There are two approaches, he said to Disaster Readiness and Preparedness:

First are the conventional hazards triggering operational responses to emergency management.

Second is a development oriented vulnerability based framework with an emphasis on vulnerability as a factor in sustained development.

It is in the second component that U.P. with its bank of experts can help tremendously in having a long-term institutional response to disasters.

We must review where hazards are and plan accordingly, he said, through the use of geohazard maps. However, another technique was to conduct computer simulations using topographic maps of the government. He stressed that an Iligan-style of Cagayan De Oro City style even could happen anywhere in the Philippines given sufficient volume of water.

Dr. Lagmay also said that even with geohazard maps, if local governments were not prepared, there would still be major problems. He stressed that it was very important to conduct drills. He said local residents needed to be briefed on where they could escape to; including evacuation routes and places to go to seek refuge from violent nature.

Forensics Team

This was headed by Dr. Raquel Fortun of the UP College of Medicine and Dr. Ma. Corazon de Ungria of the UP-National Science Research Institute DNA Analysis Lab

Their job was to assist local governments help their constituents have closure by assisting with cadaver management through the creation of a missing persons list and to help work with the national Bureau of Investigation in obtaining DNA samples of dead persons.

“The urgent task, as of yesterday, is to come out with a missing persons list,” Dr. de Ungria said during the press conference. “People cannot move on unless they know that their friends and loved ones are still alive or already dead,” she said, adding that many of the victims were still suffering from post traumatic stress disorder.

President Pascual said U.P.'s role in such events as the Iligan City disaster was to research to bring together experts on disaster risk reduction. "There will be more disasters hitting the country in the future," he said, adding that such disasters would be triggered mainly by climate changes and changes in population.

He said U.P.'s role was to help prepare local governments in ways to better manage disasters. Citing the University of the Philippines Charter of 2008 (R.A. 9500), he said U.P. was mandated to provide various forms of public service and technical assistance to civil society.

NCPAG Student Council 2011-2012 Official Statement of Solidarity Against Systemic State Abandonment

NCPAG SC 2011-2012 Official Statement of Solidarity Against Systemic State Abandonment

In the heat of UP striking back together with other State Universities and Colleges, the Student Council of the NCPAG Student Government joins the call for greater state subsidy. We are one in solidarity with the demand against systemic state abandonment of education and other social services.

The NCPAG Student Council, however, must clarify our non-usage of the term "budget cut" as to comply with proper terminologies discussed in the field of Public Administration, as the term budget is associated with the already formally legislated appropriations as opposed to what is commonly referred to budget proposal.

Despite this difference in semantics, we still stand among appalled students as we express our dismay against the blatant lack of importance that the Aquino administration is giving the education sector.

The NCPAG Student Council believes that investing in education is tantamount to investing in human capital development. The government has no excuse to not subsidize education, especially the State Universities and Colleges, when there are various way to realign the budget to augment the one for budget for it to meet the internationally recommended standards.

The proposed 2012 budget accounts for only 3.17% of our GNP, just a little over half of UNESCO's recommended 6%. As such, the NCPAG Student Council also supports the call for the legislation of the automatic appropriation of six percent of the country's GNP to the education budget.

We, iskolars and aktibistas of the nation, stand in solidarity as we demand for our right to greater state subsidy.

NO TO SYSTEMIC STATE ABANDONMENT!
INVEST IN THE FUTURE!
6% of GNP TO EDUCATION NOW!

Former National Treasurer Leonor M. Briones Expresses Reservations about P-Noy's Conditional Cash Transfer Program

By Chanda Shahani

The former National Treasurer Leonor M. Briones said that the Aquino Administration's PhP 21-billion conditional cash transfer (CCT) program will not substantially alleviate poverty.

In an interview with the Diliman Diary, Briones a professor public administration at the National College of Public Administration and Governance at the University of the Philippines (U.P.) at Diliman said that CCT's “are all right but only as one of a more comprehensive package for poverty reduction.”

She expressed concern about the “absorptive capacity” of the Department of Social Work and Development to make use of its huge increase of funding of 125% or an increase from the current PhP 12 billion to PhP 21.9 billion in 2011.

To cover a total of 2.3 million beneficiaries in 2011, the Aquino administration has increased the program's budget.

DSWD Secretary Corazon “Dinky” Soliman has said in the past that to ensure smooth program implementation, the additional 1.3M family beneficiaries next year will be categorized into phases. High poverty incidence areas like the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, Caraga, Zamboanga Peninsula, Bicol region, Samar and Leyte; covering 79 provinces in all will be prioritized.

But Professor Briones said the CCT is still a program of handouts.

Briones, convener of civil society group Social Watch Philippines, said CCT “is not a leading answer to poverty”, adding that as a policy response, CCT is deficient, and does not justify the huge loans made to fund the program.

She said that the huge CCT allocations could be a source of fund for other items that needed boost in funding especially in education, environment, agriculture and health.

“The expansion of the conditional cash transfer should be accompanied by the expansion of the supply side, for example, improvement of public health service, education and transport facilities and services in order to be successful,” she said.

“How can you give money for a child to go to school in a place where there are not enough schools?” she asked. Social Watch says that the fact that Philippine public investment in education and health is low and has generally declined between 200 and 2006 means that public investment in health and education must increase.

Briones said the program expansion should be deferred pending the submission of the program impact evaluation on the dole-out program and the completion of the National Household Targeting System for Poverty Reduction.

“Increasing the budget for inputs does not necessarily lead to increases in outputs and outcomes if the implementing capacity is insufficient,” she said.

She said that on Latin America, historical experience has shown that it was difficult to wean away recipients of CCT monies and that there must “be a clear exit strategy” including the provision of basic services and a chance for impoverished families to have employment opportunities.

Professor Briones is also the lead convenor of Social Watch Philippines which has taken the stand that the expansion of CCTs have to be accompanied by expansion of the “supply side,” that is improvement of public health services in order for this to work.

Social Watch's stand is that the CCT program expansion should be deferred pending the submission of program impact evaluation on a dole-out program agreat part from multilateral funding from nd completion of the National Household Targeting System for Poverty Reduction.

“We need to know what are the clear returns in exchange for borrowing all this money to fund this program,” she said. The current CCT program relies on the release of Land Bank of the Philippines (Landbank) ATM cards to beneficiaries. But the Landbank funds will be sourced in turn from the National Budget from funding earmarked by loans from multilateral institutions such as the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

Social Watch said that the National Government was borrowing US$ 405 million from the World Bank and US $ 400 million from the Asian Development Bank for the CCT program which only serves to increase the national indebtedness in implementing a strategy that will have limited impact on poverty reduction.

Social Watch is asking the National Government to come out with a comprehensive strategy to reduce poverty which includes social and economic policy; embedding the CCT program within the framework.

It is also important, Professor Briones said said that civil society and other groups should be involved in independently auditing and monitoring how the funds are being spent.

On the other hand, an August 24, 2010 study co-authored by U.P. School of Economics Dean Arsenio Balisacan said that said the administration of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) initiative under its Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipinong Program (4Ps) appeared to be effective as a vehicle for addressing short-term poverty and long-term human capital development and impliedly suggested that Aquino administration should continue it (see: http://diliman-diary.blogspot.com/2010/08/4.html).

The study said CCT programs are widely implemented in many developing countries, particularly in Latin America and more recently in Asia. The World Bank says CCTs "provide money directly to poor families via a “social contract” with the beneficiaries – for example, sending children to school regularly or bringing them to health centers. For extremely poor families, cash provides emergency assistance, while the conditionalities promote longer-term investments in human capital."

The UPSE study said that assessments of these programs show significant positive impacts on nutritional intakes, schooling performance,and reduction in poverty and inequality. "Of all the government's current subsidy programs, the CCT initiative holds perhaps the most promise for breaking the vicious cycle of poverty and, hence, is a good candidate for upscaling toward a national anti-poverty program," the study said.

Former National Treasurer and U.P. NCPAG Professor Leonor M. Briones on U.P.'s budget and COA's 2009 U.P. Audits

(Professor Briones at the NCPAG Library. 

Photo by: Chanda Shahani)

A total reliance by the University of the Philippines (U.P.) System on exclusive government funding is no longer realistic when the government itself is facing a PhP 300 billion deficit said Former National Treasurer and National College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG) Professor Leonor M. Briones in an interview with the Diliman Diary yesterday.

A former nominee for U.P. President, Professor Briones that a there will have to a maximization of the different properties of the university, but given the very intelligent but differing ideologies of segments of the U.P. System which has 1000 Ph.Ds and many more with advanced degrees in a total faculty population of 4,000, the new President of U.P., Alfredo E. Pascual will have to respect the various issues involved, including the historical antipathy to commercialization by many segctors within the U.P. System

Former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo committed herself to the construction of the Engineering and Science complexes which is why the budget became bigger. Now that the construction works are finished, then the budget reverts to its former status, ProfessorBriones said.

Former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo committed herself to the construction of the Engineering and Science complexes which is why the budget became big. Now that the construction works are finished, then the budget reverts to its former status.

She said that lead convenor in the Philippines of Social Watch their battle cry for U.P. was “to increase and not to restore the budget.”

She said that by way of analogy if you were the owner of a house, then it would cost so much to maintain it. But if you decided to build an extension of the house, then this would cost so much more and the overall budget would go up.

She said that the costs for maintaining the house or the expenses of U.P. fell under Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOEE) and this hs not been removed but now that the house annex or in U.P., the critical works for new buildings have been completed, then it stood to follow that the overall budget would revert back to its original status.

The proposed budget as submitted to Congress by the Department of Budget and Management and which still remains in bicameral conference committee as of this writing and gives the U.P. System PhP 5.52 billion in 2011 as opposed to PhP 6.9 billion in 2010 and PhP 8.2 billion in 2009 (see: http://www.dbm.gov.ph/NEP2011/SUCS/NCR/A.8.pdf ). 

The crux of the debate centers on the interpretation of whether the PhP 1.39 billion decrease in subsidy from 2010 to 2011 really represents a decrease in budgetary allocations or not because critical capital expenditure requirements of the U.P. System have already been met. 

Professor Briones says the completion of the Science and Engineering complexes in U.P. Diliman strictly speaking meant that very critical works have already been capitalized. However, there would nevertheless still need to be an increase in U.P.'s budget, because the wherewithal needed to operate these new facilities was lacking.

Moreover other factors such as a constant deterioration of the real value of the peso, inflation, and the needs to fund U.P.'s other strategic initiatives for growth and to maintain its overall standards of excellence in an increasingly competitive educational environment both globally and locally necessitated an increase in U.P.'s budget anyway and this should still be funded by the national government she said.

No to increasing tuition fees for students but yes to maximizing U.P.'s land assets 

Professor Briones said that she was against the increase in tuition fees for students considering that U.P. was a national university and that 33% of the entire country still lived below the poverty line. Instead U.P., being a land grant university should utilize its existing properties to generate revenues related to academic work, such as research centers and housing for retired faculty to ensure a decent quality of life even if they are no longer teaching.

She said there were two models for asset maximization with Harvard University at one end and Thailand's Chulalongkorn University at the other end. Given that the government really doesn't have a lot of money with a current budget deficit of PhP 300 billion, Professor Briones said that in the long run she would like to see U.P. sourcing 80% of its budgetary requirements from other revenues (but not including tuition fee increases), and 20% from the government.

She said that she preferred the Harvard model for revenue generation on revenues generated by state-of-the art research and other facilities driven by the expertise of its faculties. She said that although some pundits had espoused the University of Chulalongkorn in Thailand as a model worthy of emulation given that the Thai university even had bars and hotels and other revenue generating activities which were less relevant within the context of a university environment.

In 2009 the COA's Consolidated Audited Annual Report (CAAR) of the U.P. System showed a summarized Sources and Uses of Funds statement for the entire U.P. System showing that in 2009 the subsidies from the National Government were PhP 6 billion, and other revenue was PhP 1.4 billion.

She called for a comprehensive land use plan for all of U.P.'s land assets. For example, she said that in Talisay City, Negros Oriental U.P. owned hectares of sugar land that was now generating revenue as a sugar research facility. Unfortunately, there were many more U.P. properties that were populated with informal settlers and the issue of maximizing revenues from these properties was still left hanging.

She said that when she was Chairperson of the Board of Siliman University it became possible to systematically increase the salaries of the faculty every year due to a comprehensive land use plan that resulted in additional revenues for Siliman University.

In comparison, U.P. also leases out the 37.5 hectare North Science and Technology Park, located along Commonwealth Avenue in Diliman where the U.P.-AyalaLand Technohub is located. She said that the original concept for the usage of this property, as hatched under former U.P. President Emil Javier was for the property to house big research institutions interfacing with the best scientific and engineering minds in the U.P. faculty backed up by U.P. graduate and undergraduate students.

Instead of this original vision being implemented what is on hand these days in terms of locators are low-end call centers who are even at the bottom-end of the food chain the outsourcing industries as these add the least value compared to knowledge process outsourcing locators or research labs who require higher-end technical, scientific and engineering talents that U.P. has.

Aside from land use, she said that from a revenue perspective, AyalaLand was making even more money by subleasing the property it was renting out from U.P. to higher-end restaurants and U.P. could have swung a better deal and should do so in the future with its other properties.

She said even though former U.P. President and now Senator Edgardo J. Angara had coined the term, “University of the Philippine System,” it was still a misnomer to regard the U.P. System as one entire organic entity with overlapping and redundant course offerings straddling the entire Philippine archipelago.

The U.P. System is actually made up of seven constituent universities serving their geographic areas of jurisdiction with particular strengths which is why it would be a mistake to only have a department or Institute of Biology or other foundation course in only one constituent university as thiis base o knowledge would be needed no matter what was the area of specialization in life sciences, for example.

She said that while U.P. Diliman had the best public management program in NCPAG, there was still a need to have this program in the other constituent universities, many of the faculty of whom come from NCPAG anyway, she said.

“We should be looked at as different universities without any redundancies,” she said of the constituent universities comprising the U.P. System.

The great challenge, she said is for all the constituent universities to pursue the development and improvement of quality graduate education programs .

You should also bear in mind that there is a big difference between public institutions versus private instutions. While the intellectual expectations and standards are similar in public institutions such as U.P., the very public character of U.P. creates less freedom of movement, she said.

She said that for example for U.P. to become a more flexible institution, Faculty salaries had to become more competitive if you want to retain its quality faculty.

The evolution of university-affiliated foundations and the need to remove conflicts of interest 

Professor Briones said that as a natural consequence, foundations evolved in order to augment the incomes of faculties in such a way that no resources were siphoned off from the coffers of the state.

She said that even Congressmen and Senators put up their own private foundations because of the great bureaucratic restrictions placed upon expenditures of funds coming directly from the National Government’s budgets. “Even honest Congressmen with the best intentions in the world to find imaginative ways to help their constitutents put up foundations inorder to maximized their freedom of movements,” she explained.

But she also said that her long experience as an administrator in U.P. demonstrated to her that U.P. faculty members who were administrators who simultaneously headed foundations such as the U.P. Foundation did so honestly and should be given the benefit of the doubt.

“Malicious minds can impute bad motives into structural deficiences in the system” which inherently create conflict-of-interest type situations, she said. However she said while she did not believe that U.P. officials were benefitting from these, it was still important to remove the conflict of interest by requiring that the U.P. President or official heading any of these university-affiliated foundations not be allowed to do so “for structural reasons because the temptation is always there.”

Professor Briones referred to Diliman Diary reportage on the issue, including a Diliman Diary report last November 5, 2010 (http://diliman-diary.blogspot.com/2010/11/breaking-news-coa-releases-2009-audit_05.html) which quoted the Commission on Audit's 2009 Consolidated Audited Annual report which criticized the current U.P. Administration for tolerating the existence of university-affiliated foundations that were headed by ranking U.P. officials which created undue advantage

She added that the COA CAAR of 2009 showed that in 2009 the U.P. System had assets of PhP 36 billion and liabilities of PhP 13 billion and so in the balance sheet the remaining equity of the government owned U.P. System was PhP 23 billion which seemingly represented a lot of money.

Fortunately she said that former College of Business Dean Jaime Laya who was a Department of Budget and Management Commissioner worked out an arrangement with COA when she was Secretary to the Commission on Audit which allowed U.P. to keep its unused income instead of it reverting back to the National Treasury.

Does U.P. Have Lots of Money? NOT.

Professor Briones showed the Diliman Diary the consolidated financial statements of the U.P. System derived from COA's 2009 CAARs (to download these, please click: http://www.coa.gov.ph/Audit/AAR.htm) and pointed out areas that she thought were troubling. "We have to improve and respond to these findings. Dapat huwag pabayaan," she stressed.

"For example, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Franklin Drilon thinks that the U.P. System has lots of money, because if you look at the ending cash balance of the 2009 statement of cash flows, the figure is positive PhP 12 billion," she said.

"What Senator Drilon did not consider is that most of this money is already programmed for legitimate university expenses and is therefore already spoken for," she said.

COA's scathing criticisms of U.P.'s multi-year refusals to allow the opening up of the books of university-affiliated foundations to COA oversight adds to the impression that U.P. is rolling in easy money from private donations and other funding when it is in fact not. However, U.P. would make its case stronger with DBM and Congress if there were fewer highlighted findings from COA, she said.

Professor Briones also pointed out to COA's report about the operations of the University Hotel in U.P. Diliman which had a gross income of PhP 30 million in 2009. Unfortunately, other details such as net income were not available because the U.P. Administration has not followed COA's previous year's recommendations to submit the financial reports of University Hotel operations for consolidation in the U.P. System books.

"It was important in the interests of oversight, for the concerned authorities to have access to the contract between the University Hotel and the U.P. Administration," she said.

She also pointed out to the following items from COA which tended  to show that the U.P. System was not exercising good financial management:

• PhP 151.65 million in unutilized scholarship grants in 2009.
• In the 2009 U.P. System Balance Sheet, while PhP 36 billion in total assets might look good, a deeper analysis showed that there was PhP 445 million is accounts receivable, which meant that the U.P. System as a whole was not doing a good enough job in collecting money owed to the System.
• Unreconciled book and bank balances (U.P. System wide)
• While total Property Plant and Equipment might show a hefty PhP 24 billion in 2009, in reality much of this equipment may or may not be in good shape and this was an uknown precisely because updated inventories of these assets did not yet exist.

"We have to be very careful on the accounting side," Briones said if U.P. is to successfully make its case with the national government for an increase in its annual budget.

(With reporting by Chanda Shahani)

U.P. Student points out errors in Diliman Diary's coverage of U.P. NCPAG Professor Briones' remarks as a nominee in several fora for U.P. Presidential nominees

Editor's note: We are reposting below an email we have received today from U.P. Student John J. M. Duldulao pointing out several errors in our past reporting of the remarks of University of the Philippines (U.P.) National College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG) Professor Leonor M. Briones, who is one of eleven nominees for U.P. President. Several fora were held at U.P. Los Banos, U.P. Diliman and U.P. Manila where the nominees presented their visions for U.P. and answered questions from the audiences. The Diliman Diary has corrected the errors and apologizes for any inconvenience we may have caused. Mr. Duldulao also sent copies of the written speeches of Professor Briones at these three fora the texts of which we are making available to interested readers, who may click on the links below:

Speech of Professor Leonor M. Briones at U.P. Los Banos on September 20, 2010:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40290525/U-P-Los-Banos-Speech-of-Prof-Leonor-M-Briones-on-9-20-2010

Speech of Professor Leonor M. Briones at U.P. Diliman on September 24, 2010:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40290421/U-P-Diliman-Speech-Prof-Leonor-M-Briones-on-9-24-2010

Speech of Professor Leonor M. Briones at U.P. Manila on October 14, 2010:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40290734/U-P-Manila-Speech-Prof-Leonor-M-Briones-on-10-14-2010

Letter of Mr. John J. M. Duldulao

26 October 2010

The Editor

Diliman Diary

diliman-diary.blogspot.com

Dear Sir:

Thank you for keeping us informed and updated on the search process for the next UP President! Your posts on the fora are very helpful in making the constituents, alumni and supporters of the university aware of the nominees’ visions and views on different UP issues.

In view of this, I would like to share additional information on the statements as reported in the blog posts. It is mentioned in the September 24 post that “…Briones told the audience that she ‘left PhP 125 billion with the National Treasury when I was fired by then President Joseph E. Estrada…’"[i] However, it was not then President Estrada who fired Professor Briones for telling the truth; it was then President Gloria M. Arroyo who fired her for not lying in favor of the latter. In fact, the PhP 125 billion, that is comprised of PhP 75 billion in the custody of the Bureau of Treasury and PhP 50 billion in the custody of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, is what was left by the Estrada administration when Prof. Briones was the Treasurer of the Philippines. Former UP President Dodong Nemenzo even said that because of this, which he referred to as the strongest evidence of Prof. Briones’ integrity, he felt proudest of her[ii].

Meanwhile, in the October 15 sidebar article, it is stated that “[s]he said that if she became U.P. President, she could help address this issue by getting back gthe PhP 100 million taken out of U.P.'s Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) in the national budget as well as the Php 300 million still owed to it by the national government under the U.P. Charter.”[iii]  She actually said “she could help address this issue by getting back the PhP 1.179 billion in the MOOE which was not granted by the DBM.” In fact, that was what she requested from Congress in the Appropriations Committee hearing when she presented the alternative budget proposal.

The alternative budget that she presented stated that,

“[t]he University of the Philippines needs additional funds for Maintenance and Other Operating Expenditures (MOOE) to meet budget deficiencies for existing programs and projects; including provision of fund for utilities (water and electricity) and repair and maintenance of various school buildings and facilities of different campuses of the UP System. Likewise, there is need to appropriate necessary funds for the completion and start of operation of several buildings of the National Science Complex (NSC) and the Engineering for Research and Development for Technology (ERDT) Projects of the College of Engineering.

Under RA 9500, ‘An Act to Strengthen the University of the Philippines as the National University,’ it is mandated that ‘in addition to the regular appropriations for the University under the annual GAA, a centennial fund shall be appropriated in the amount of One Hundred Million pesos (PhP 100M) per year for a period of 5 years which shall likewise be included in the GAA.’”[iv]

I hope that I was able to share substantially in addition to the information that your team has gathered for the Search Process for the next UP President. I am also attaching copies of Prof. Briones’ speeches that I have obtained from the fora for the nominees for UP President. Thank youand mabuhay po kayo!

Sincerely,

JOHN J. M. DULDULAO

Student, University of the Philippines

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[i] "U.P.’s problems are ventilated by its very own nominees for U.P. President as they present their visions, and answer questions before critical audiences at UP Diliman and the rest of the U.P. System." Diliman Diary. Diliman Diary, 24 Sep 2010. Web. 26 Oct 2010. <http://diliman-diary.blogspot.com/2010/09/ups-problems-are-ventilated-their-own.html>.

[ii] Nemenzo, Francisco. Parangal: Prof. Leonor M. Briones. UP National College of Public Administration and Governance. Assembly Hall, UP-NCPAG, Quezon City. 18 10 2010. Speech.

[iii] "Open Forum answers of Nominees for U.P. President on October 14, 2010, at Science Hall, U.P. PGH."Diliman Diary. Diliman Diary, 15 10 2010. Web. 26 Oct 2010. <http://diliman-diary-sidebars.blogspot.com/2010/10/open-forum-answers-of-nominees-for-up.html>.

[iv]Social Watch Philippines. Alternative Budget Fiscal Year 2011. 1st ed. Quezon City: 2010. 35. Print.