UP Students Uphold Student Representation

BY JEFFREY OCAMPO

Contributor Bulatlat

In a historic referendum, the students of the University of the Philippines (UP) reaffirmed the rules governing the selection of their lone representative to the highest policy-making body of the university.

An overwhelming 73 percent of those who voted in the referendum approved the existing Codified Rules for the Student Regent Selection (CRSRS).

The Republic Act 9500 or the UP Charter paved the way for the conduct of the said referendum. Enacted in April 2008, the Charter states that the Board of Regents shall include: “One Student Regent, to serve for a term of one (1) year, chosen by the students from their ranks in accordance with rules and qualifications approved in a referendum by the students.”

The referendum would either endorse or stamp out the CRSRC which has existed for the past 13 years.

Shahana Abdulwahid, the present Student Regent (SR) of the University of the Philippines (UP), formally announced the result of the five-day student referendum, Feb. 6.

Out of 47,635 students within the UP System, 26,118 voted, according to the Office of the Student Regent’s (OSR) official tally.

Airah Cadiogan, the system-wide referendum committee head said the voter turnout, which is 55 percent of the entire student population of the UP System, is quite an accomplishment. She said that for a very long time, the UP students’ voice, as made clear through their participation in electoral processes within the university, had not been as valiant as it was in the recently-concluded referendum.

For or against

In the referendum, students were to vote for or against the further implementation of the CRSRS in the nomination and selection process of the SR. Thus, the question was whether a student is in favor or against the ratification of the present selection guidelines.

The document, which was collectively penned by the members of the General Assembly of Student Councils in 1996, has been the guiding principle of the selection of the SR since then.

A “yes” vote meant that a student agreed that CRSRS should still be implemented as official guidelines to the process of the selection and should therefore be ratified. A “direct effect” of the vote, said Abdulwahid, was the immediate nomination and eventual selection of the new SR. She added that any student or student formation may then propose amendments to the provisions in the CRSRS that are deemed to be in need of changes.

Another important implication of the vote is the prevention of intervention of the university administration in the SR selection process as stated in one of its provisions.

“No” vote, on the other hand, meant opposition to the further existence of the CRSRS. The danger of the vote, noted Abdulwahid, was placing the decision on the matter of the SR selection on the hands of the university administration. The administration, then, can either decide not to grant the post or appoint one that is “pro-administration”, stressed Abdulwahid. A scenario of a Malacañang-appointed student assuming the SR post was also a possibility, related the student leader.

Further, the process by which the SR will then be selected and the body which would perform the task are unknown to the students, even to the present SR, hitherto.

Student groups who supported the “no” vote, meanwhile, wanted to include their proposed amendments regarding the selection process and the qualifications of the nominee in the new codified rules.

The result

At the onset, Adbulwahid was foreseeing a difficult circumstance in attaining the 50 percent plus one stipulation as instructed by UP Vice President for Legal Affairs Theodore Te. She even pointed out that Te did not present the basis for such requirement.

The present SR cited logistical limitations that might result from the meager P60,000 budget allocated for the referendum by the administration that was taken from its discretionary funds. She related that the sum of almost a million pesos that was used for the referendum was largely contributed by the volunteers of the student referendum from different UP units.

Abdulwahid accounted the success of the referendum to the rigorous effort exerted by the current composition of the OSR alongside other student groups, formations, councils and individual students in campaigning for the student participation in the referendum.

Largely, it was the students across UP System and their will to save the OSR that ultimately made the day, Abdulwahid said.

Seventy-three percent of the total votes cast was for the retention of the current CRSRS; 26 percent, meanwhile, voted against it.

The yes vote won in 13 units of the UP System including Los Baños, Manila, Baguio, Cebu, Mindanao, Iloilo, Miagao, Pampanga and Tacloban and in its flagship campus in Diliman. The vote also won in UP’s extension campuses in Baler, Aurora and in Palo Leyte. Majority of the Open University students also voted yes.

UP Mindanao, meanwhile, delivered the highest turnout for the “yes” vote. Out of the 86 percent of the student population or 749 students who voted, 737 voted yes.

In UP Diliman, largely populated colleges such as the College of Engineering, Education, Social Sciences and Philosophy and Science, students voted in favor of the CRSRS.

Victory

The referendum has been a success, said Abdulwahid.

She furthered that it is a victory of the students in their quest to save the institution. The existence of a student representative in the BOR, Abdulwahid stressed, is the end result of the struggle of the student for democratic representation of the student sector, which comprise the majority of the UP community.

The referendum has been a challenge “faced valiantly” by the determined students who wanted to retain student representation in the BOR, said Abdulwahid.

However, the quest of the new SR has a long way ahead.

The nomination process and the announcement of the next GASC to select the new SR will be scheduled in April. Cadiogan said that there will also be information drive among the students regarding the CRSRS.

From among those who fight for the retention of institution, there has been quite a relief from the stress and tension that mounted in the verge losing the OSR. However, steps forward must be taken by the new SR and the rest of the students amid the attack on the student’s democratic rights and their very place in the university, said Abdulwahid. (Bulatlat.com)

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