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September 23, 2000

DISGUSTED with the P 24 M - DECS luxury car scandal, student leaders from the National Federation of Student Councils lambasted Secretary Andrew Gonzales of Education and other Department officials for improper use of funds.

According to Mr. Dennis Velasco, NFSC National President, that amidst the outstanding shortage in education budget 'our education officials chose to buy luxurious vehicles instead of books and desks for our elementary and high school students'.

"The question here is 'which is which' badly needs the P 24M donation. Is it our tens of education officials who were demanding service vehicles or the thousands of Filipino students who were clamoring for a higher budget in order to purchase shortage in books and other school facilities and hire additional teachers?'

Also according to Velasco, although their group are sympathetic to the needs of our education officials, the group still believes that these officials needs "a castigation from the students for acquiring 'service vehicles' which is too costly to be denominated as such."

Despite the fact that another cut in education budget took place this year and is expected to happen next year, 'this move of our education officials add insult to injuries facing by our education sector today'.

The group also fears that this scam could be another reason for our legislators to further cut the budget for education. In this light, the group called for our legislators for a 'Dagdag-Bawas' in education budget.

"Additional budget [dagdag] for DECS allocation that will directly go to teachers and students, such increment in wages and other incentives to teachers and purchasing of additional education materials, building of classrooms and hiring of teachers for the student."

The group on the other hand proposed for 'freeze or even cut [bawas] on those budget allocations, which is discretionary to those top education officials.' [30]