Somewhere between a school’s demand to collect tuition, and City Hall’s refusal to pay, over 1,000 students of the Asian College of Technology International Educational Foundation (ACTIEF) are left twisting in the wind.
Each institution is concerned about preserving its interest.
Who’s watching out for the students’ welfare?
ACT officials know they will no longer enjoy the gravy train of scholars enrolling every year with tuition vouchers paid by City Hall every semester.
ACT’s heyday is over. The founder, Rep. Rodrigo “Bebot” Abellanosa, not only has an Ombudsman verdict of guilt in a graft case for conflict of interest, he’s a political opponent of Mayor Michael Rama.
ACT wants to collect P26 million in unpaid scholarship fees for two previous years. The school’s quarrel is with City Hall.
So why turn the pressure on ACT students by refusing to release their Transcript of Records? Without this document, how can graduates apply for a job and students make a decent transfer to another school by June?
Reason: The city hasn’t paid. Maybe City Hall will cough it up after seeing the students suffer.
Mayor Rama says his hands are tied and has shifted the burden of deciding the legality of payment to the court.
That’s convenient for him. But it will take weeks, even months, for a judge to rule on the petition for declaratory relief.
Why won’t the mayor pay? He fears being slapped with a graft case for channeling more tax money to a private school that had benefited from political favoritism.
That worry, however, doesn’t end his obligation as mayor to beneficiaries of the city’s scholarship program.
The program was started by his predecessor mayor Tomas Osmeña. When Rama was elected in 2010, he adopted a similar program, with the same aim – to help high school graduates who can’t afford a college education. Each qualified scholar receives P10,000 per semester for tuition and P1,000 allowance a month. Scholars have to enroll in accredited schools. ACT fell out of favor after the Ombudsman’s decision against Abellanosa was released last year.
Fear of a graft case can be handled by City Hall lawyers, who can argue that the mayor is acting in good faith.
So we ask again, who’s standing up for the students and their parents, who look to Cebu City as their only chance for an affordable – not free – college education?
This sorry group needs a champion to sue both ACT and City Hall for doing a poor job of protecting the interest of students at a crossroads.
The timing of their dilemma is cruel. Classes start in June. Transfer now with no assurance of being accepted in a new school? Or stay enrolled in ACT “at your own risk” in the words of Mayor
Rama, with no subsidy from City Hall or peace of mind that your grades will be released?
Someone should take the case to court so the school and City Hall can be ordered to spare students from their intramurals, and give priority to what matters most ––- an education for qualified CebuCity youths who should not be held hostage in this political wrangling over the collection of money.
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