President Arroyo’s recent unveiling of the P1-billion “Katas ng VAT Pantawid Aral” could have made her look like a generous leader, but education advocacy groups said Friday that the amount is nowhere near her administration’s incurred debt to the education sector.
Based on the Delors Benchmark, the internationally-agreed benchmark for education budget since its presentation to the UNESCO in 1996, the Arroyo administration was short of P272.4 billion in education spending for 2007, said the education advocates.
The international benchmark, derived from former European Commission president Jacques Delors report titled “Learning: the Treasure from Within” recommends 6 percent of a country’s annual gross national product (GNP) to education.
Based on statistics from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, the country’s GNP for 2007 reached P7.274 trillion. Six percent of the amount is P436.5 billion.
Records of the Youth Advocacy Group (YAD) said the government’s education spending for 2007 was only P164.1 billion.
In the 2008 General Appropriations Act, the allocation for the Department of Education is P149 billion, which Malacañang boasted as the “biggest in recent years.”
In a press conference on Friday, YAD also presented a comparative computation of what it said is Mrs. Arroyo’s debt to education to past administrations of Fidel Ramos and Joseph Estrada.
The table showed Mrs. Arroyo, in her seven years in Malacañang, had incurred at least an “education debt” of P1.3 trillion. The previous two presidents’ combined “education debt”, the group said, is P330 billion.
The combined “education debts” of the three administrations is P1.6 trillion, which YAD said, if gradually paid by the government, can solve the education sector’s financial problem.
‘Six will fix’
YAD suggested that the government should make an effort to reach the 6 percent from GNP benchmark by adding one percent more of the GNP to the education budget in the next three years.
Still on YAD’s presentation, last year’s budget for education represents 2.26 percent of the annual GNP.
The group complained that while Mrs. Arroyo claims the GNP grew since she came into power in 2001, the budgetary allocation cost for education became almost stagnant.
The highest budget that was allotted for education compared to the percentage of GNP was during the time of Estrada with 3.80 percent in 1998.
“This can be done in a gradual manner, with a 1% of GNP increase yearly for education spending until 2010,” the group said.
No ‘band aid’ please…
Rene Raya, co-convenor of the Social Watch Philippines, said Mrs. Arroyo’s P1 billion scholarship program can become “good” if it’s “targeting” will be properly announced by the government.
“It should come in a package, not [used as] a band aid [solution]. This is what we don’t want, band-aid solutions. Want we want the government to address is the worsening quality [of education],” Raya said.
He said government subsidies, just like the P1-billion additional scholarship fund, is perceived by serious education advocacy groups as a tool for the administration’s “survival.”
Mrs. Arroyo said half a billion pesos would fund scholarship grants for poor and “not-so-smart ones’ and the other half for loans. College students availing of the loan can get as much as P8,000 per semester, which can be paid back two to four years after graduation.
“Aside from the P1 billion from the VAT, we have also from the DBP (Development Bank of the Philippines), advocating quality education for poor but intelligent students. Iyon ang kaibaha, kasi iyung katas ng VAT, kahit na hindi kayo masyadong matalino, basta’t pumapasa kayo, OK, pero itong DBP kailangan matalino kayo,” said Arroyo.
Alain del Pascua, president of the Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan, meanwhile, sees the scholarship and student loan fund as a “short-term appeasement” for the education sector because schools are opening next week.
Pascua added that the “katas ng VAT” should not be used by Mrs. Arroyo as her “pork barrel” as it should be included in the national budget which can only be disbursed through Congress’s approval.
More money
Various groups, including Education Net (E-Net) Philippines, Action for Economic Reforms, YAD, Oxfam-Great Britain, Teachers Inc., PS Link, and Teachers’ Dignity Coalition (TDC), have come up with an initial draft of “Alternative Budget for Education 2009.”
The alternative budget initiative (ABI) was initially launched Friday in Quezon City.
The TDC said the government can only fulfill its promise of high-quality education if it will “invest in teachers.”
It suggested that the government should allocate P6 billion for the salaries of 16,000 additional teachers and 22,460 “local government unit” teachers who receive meager pays; P570 million for “additional” P1,000 for in-service training for teachers; P40 billion for the unpaid benefits under the Magna Carta for Teachers; and P8.5 billion for maintenance and operating expenses for a “conducive learning environment.
Melchor Cayabyab, TDC secretary-general, said during the presentation that the P40 billion unpaid benefits for teachers is only for the year 2008.
The Magna Carta for Teachers, which outlines benefits the government should provide for teachers, was passed during the 1960’s, but past and the present administrations have not fully implemented it.
E-Net, meanwhile, proposes a total of P950 million for alternative learning for the millions of Filipinos who have been deprived of their basic right for education.
The groups pegged the amounts mentioned at P55 billion.
Raya said that the amount will grow bigger as the groups involved in drafting the ABI are continuously talking with more members of the education sector.
He said a full alternative budget suggestion will be ready by August or before Malacañang submits its 2009 national budget proposal to Congress.
Raya said education advocacy groups had been engaging the government in alternative budget deliberations for the last three years.
Last year, he said the ABI and the groups’ intense lobbying and pleading to legislators resulted to the P3.2-billion increase in education allotment.
He hopes that by 2009, the government will really accept education’s importance to achieve its goal for a richer Philippine economy.
11.6 million, not one million OSY
Data showed by E-Net, which it said was sourced from the National Statistics Office 2003 Functional Literacy, Education and Mass Media Survey (FLEMMS), said 34 percent or 11.6 million of the 34 million population of 6-24 years old, are out of school.
Reginaldo Guillen, E-Net’s campaigns and advocacy associate, said Education Secretary Jesli Lapus could have unconsciously misled people when he announced during a radio interview this week that there are only one million out-of-school youths (OSY).
Guillen said Lapus could have been referring to the 1.8 million out-of-school youths aged 6-11.
The Department of Education’s (DepEd) data, as presented by E-Net, showed that in 2003-2004, 6-11 year-olds have a total population of 12,280,388. Children under the age range who are attending school is 10,438,329, leaving a deficit of 1,842,058 OSYs.
Another data showed by E-Net, also based on DepEd statistics for 2003-2004, said the total population of children aged 12-15 was 7,296,824. Of the figure, 3,356,539 were “in-school” and 3,940,285 were OSYs.
Based on the FLEMMS, 30.5 percent of out-of-school youths cited employment or the need to work for turning back from their studies. Twenty-two percent, meanwhile, cited lack of interest, 19.9 percent cited education’s high costs and 11.8 reasoned housekeeping.
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