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RAMA TELLS SCHOLARS ENROLLED AT ACT:
Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama told the 119 Cebu City scholars enrolled at the Asian College of Technology to withdraw and look for another school.
“Pataka lang og enroll kahibalo naa pa’y problema… But, there’s always time to withdraw,” Rama said referring to the pending civil case the city filed in court against ACT.
This as ACT owner south district Representative Rodrigo Abellanosa also said Rama should stop blaming him for the problem the scholars are facing now.
Rama said scholars did not ask permission from the City Scholarship Committee considering that there is a pressing legal issue on the payment of tuition fees of the city scholars.
Also, Rama said the city has no new signed agreement with ACT, therefore there is no legal and official basis for the scholars to enroll at ACT.
But Rama said if the parents think and believe that their children are better off in ACT they can’t force them to transfer to other accredited schools.
“I am leaving it to the parents if they think they can handle and stick it out there. The city government position is that we are not going to be bringing more complications but we are simplifying matters,” Rama said.
Scholarship committee head Ida Yting, however, pointed out that those who prefer to stay at ACT will no longer be recognized as city scholars and there privileges will be forfeited, including the P10,000 tuition fee and P1,000 allowance for school supplies.
ACT lawyer Edison Ariola contended that the existing scholars can still enroll and resume their studies at ACT because they are covered by the 2011 memorandum of agreement.
“…It is our understanding as well as the understanding of the students that the MOA means that if a student qualifies for a four-year degree then his scholarship is set for a four-year degree,” he said.
The city government, Ariola said, should think of the welfare of the students, rather than giving more importance to the involved “personality”.
“If the city government thinks that they can circumvent the law by saying that there is a force majeure, maybe they should remind themselves that we’re talking about the right of student to college education… the personalities are just personalities, let’s not use them to make the students suffer,” he said.
Moreover, Ariola alleged that there seems to be a “deliberate effort to delay the payment.”
The city owes the school P135 million representing the tuition of the scholars, including the P26 million December billing for the second semester of the current school year.
As to the payment, the city government is still asking the court to determine if City Hall can still pay for the school fees of its scholars enrolled at ACT.
The city hesitated releasing the payment because the anti-graft office last year found Abellanosa guilty of grave misconduct for conflict of interest in the city government’s scholarship program.
The decision came after City Hall employee Philip Banguiran filed an administrative complaint in December 2012 against Abellanosa, who was then city councilor and trustee-president of ACT, when he signed the accreditation of his school on June 14, 2010.
DON’T BLAME ME
In his official statement, Abellanosa said Rama’s failure to pay the monetary dues to ACT has caused them and the students “actual injury”.
Abellanosa said the contract in the scholarship program is actually between the city government and the city scholars through the scholarship certificates or vouchers.
The mayor, Abellanosa said, should not use his case in delaying its monetary obligation to ACT and to the students as well.
He also said that compelling the scholars to transfer to other schools is already “harassment”, which is a clear “violation and defiance” of the city’s implementing rules and regulations on scholarship program.
“Mayor Mike Rama should stop using me as his convenient scapegoat for his total failure to sustain the Cebu City Scholarship Program initiated by former Mayor Tommy Osmeña. He is now trying so hard to seek refuge in my ombudsman case and to blame me for his utter neglect of the scholarship program. The city mayor cannot renege on this contract and continue to blame my pending ombudsman case,” he said.
“Mayor Mike should stop playing seriously dumb for the sake of the hundreds of parents and city scholars who are now severely injured by his gross immersion in political maneuvers at the expense of their welfare. His lousy excuse of dragging my pending case in the ombudsman, which is still under a motion for reconsideration and no relevance and connection at all with the city’s scholarship contract with the city scholars, will only prolong the agony of the scholars, their parents and families,” he added.