Will there be two Angaras sitting in the U.P. Board of Regents?

By Chanda Shahani

Senator Edgardo J. Angara, Chairperson of the Senate Committee on Education, Arts and Culture and a former U.P. President, will represent the Senate in the U.P. Board of Regents.

This was confirmed by the Secretariat of the Senate in a telephone call made by the Diliman Diary.

There is also a high probability that Senator Angara's son, Rep. Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara (Aurora, LDP) will sit in the BOR by virtue of his probable position as Chairman of the House Committee on Higher and Technical Education.

The expected result will be that if Rep. Angara sits as a U.P. Regent, then he and Senator Angara will constitute an important swing vote or two-man voting bloc within the eleven-person BOR.

Telephone calls to the House of Representatives Secretariat and to Rep. Angara's office by the Diliman Diary elicited the information that while no Committee Chairmanships had been formalized yet, there was an expectation that Rep. Angara would get this post.

The online newspaper Journal Online has said that Rep. Angara would likely get the position as part of the horse trading of committee chairmanships among different political parties that elected Rep. Sonny Belmonte (6th District, Quezon City) as House Speaker (http://www.journal.com.ph/index.php/top-stories/14612-house-committee-chairmen-named.html).

The Committee Chairmanship positions in the House of Representatives are expected to be finalized before the third week of August, 2010.

Under Republic Act 9500 or the University of the Philippines (U.P.) Charter of 2008 (http://www.lawphil.net/statutes/repacts/ra2008/ra_9500_2008.html) the Chairperson of the Senate Committee on Education, Arts and Culture and the Chairperson of the House Committee on Higher and Technical Education both sit on the U.P. BOR in order to represent both Houses of Congress.

With the start of operations by new leaders in the House of Representatives and the Senate in the 15th Congress last July 26, 2010, former Senator Manuel Roxas who used to be Senate Committee on Education, Arts and Culture Chairperson and Rep. Cynthia B. Villar (Las Pinas, NP) who used to be Chairperson of the House Committee on Higher and Technical Education have effectively stepped down as regents in the BOR.

(Chanda Shahani is the Editor of the Diliman Diary).

OP-ED: The Day After the Disrupted March 24 U.P. Board of Regents Meeting - An Apology - of sorts

Editor's Note: the following apology and the embedded video and graphic above were posted (author unknown) in a Facebook site entitled, a Public Apology from the U.P. Community (http://www.facebook.com/publicapology#!/publicapology?v=app_2347471856). To get the side of the U.P. Administration which is posted on the U.P. System website, please click on: http://up.edu.ph/features.php?i=195

A Public Apology from the UP Community Regarding the Events of March 24, 2010

We are from the University of the Philippines (UP), and on behalf of our dear Board of Regents (BOR), especially the esteemed President Emerlinda Roman, we apologize. Contrary to what the whole nation witnessed on March 24, 2010, not all members of the University are rude, uncouth and disrespectful.

Contrary to what the whole nation witnessed on March 24, 2010, there are some of us who still believe in defending our constitutional rights, in democratic governance, in a leader's polite and steadfast service to her constitutents.

We are sorry that our BOR has acted with such vulgarity as to sow disillusionment, disgust and disunity within the University. We are sorry that this kind of confrontational violence has had to happen, but the actions of the UP administration have left us no choice. It is our greatest shame that UP, the "National University," has set the chilling trend among state universities of railroading unjust tuition increases through the blatant disregard of democratic principles. No carefully-worded statement, no polite dialogue, no humble request has been heeded by President Roman and her colleagues. Instead, they have chosen to rudely disenfranchise the UP community, including its sectoral regents, in order to have their way with the University's policies, leadership and overall thrust. These are embarrassing actions which are highly unbecoming of an Iskolar ng Bayan, and on their behalf, we apologize.

We apologize further for the apathy of those in our ranks who seem to be more concerned with civil gestures rather than the welfare of the people. We are sorry that this culture of misplaced priorities has been allowed to spread among the community, no thanks to President Roman being in the vanguard of such an obscene mindset. We do not apologize, however, for our militant actions; again, we wish to emphasize that the inconsiderate leadership of the Roman administration has left us with no other choice but to confront it head-on.

We are sorry to have sullied a national architectural treasure like Juan Nakpil's Quezon Hall, but the damage is not something a coat of paint and a good scrubbing cannot remedy. The damage President Roman and the BOR have caused to the University, to education, and to the people, however, cannot be so easily repaired. For that, we are truly sorry.