PDI: Neri agrees to meet student groups on tuition issue

By Jerry E. Esplanada
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 21:44:00 03/10/2008

MANILA, Philippines — Nearly seven months after assuming the Commission on Higher Education top post, acting chairman Romulo Neri has finally expressed his willingness to meet with leaders of various student organizations on tuition and other tertiary education issues.

Neri has instructed CHEd Executive Director William Medrano to arrange the meeting.

In a text message to the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Neri said he would inform CHEd Commissioners Nona Ricafort, Nenalyn Defensor, Luningning Misuarez-Umar and Saturnino Ocampo Jr. about the dialogue with the student leaders, including those belonging to leftwing groups.

Leaders of the League of Filipino Students (LFS), Anakbayan and Youth Act NOW (YAN)! welcomed what they called a “positive development.”

“That’s good news,” said LFS chair Vencer Crisostomo.

Anakbayan spokesperon Sarah Katrina Maramag said they asked for a meeting with Neri as early as August 2007 when he took over the post vacated by Carlito Puno, now head of the government-sequestered Coconut Chemicals Inc.

YAN! spokesperson Alvin Peters said Neri’s “change of heart” came rather late. “Tuition consultations ended on February 28,” he noted.

A top CHEd official has appealed to student leaders to “limit the dialogue’s talking points to tertiary education issues.”

Maramag, however, said otherwise. “If the dialogue pushes through, he also has to come prepared to answer queries regarding the National Broadband Network-ZTE Corp. controversy. There is no better venue to do this than in front of students who are the new defenders of truth,” she said.

Crisostomo, meanwhile, expressed the hope Neri would not back out at the last minute.

The students recalled that upon learning that Neri was slipping out of the University of the Philippines-Mindanao building, groups of protesters, including members of LFS and Anakbayan, angrily chased Neri, who was tightly guarded by security escorts.

The militant Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), which has repeatedly called for Neri’s resignation, said his “involvement in the NBN-ZTE scandal has rendered him incapable of effectively discharging his duties as CHEd chair.”

“How can he speak with any credibility on education issues with his role in the NBN-ZTE controversy hounding him? How can he speak at all given the tight security the Office of the President provides him?” said ACT chair Antonio Tinio.

Like the LFS, ACT has “given up on Neri to do a Jun Lozada,” said Tinio, referring to the star witness who revealed corruption in the NBN negotiations.

ACT said Neri “turned into a cowardly bureaucrat and a beneficiary of a hopelessly corrupt regime.”

Neri has repeatedly rejected calls by various groups for his resignation.

“I have no reason to and I have no intention to resign. I have followed the rule of law in all my actions,” Neri earlier told the Philippine Daily Inquirer, parent company of INQUIRER.net.

Neri agrees to meet student groups on tuition issue

Reposted from Youth Act Now