Asenior deputy minority leader has called out the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) for its poor utilization of the Higher Education Development Fund (HEDF).
“I maintain my position that [CHED] Chairman [Prospero E.] De Vera is not a responsible steward of the resources to uplift our country’s most vulnerable citizens’ the poorest of the poor. These are our citizens who are in need of every avenue for assistance that enables a better life for them and their families,” Northern Samar Rep. Paul R. Daza said.
While the HEDF is not entirely a scholarship fund, Daza stressed that it is primarily used to strengthen capabilities of Higher Education Institutions to improve education standards.
“I have serious concerns regarding the utilization of this fund. Data shows that P10 billion of the 2021 HEDF remains unspent, sitting idly in the coffers,” he said.
“With all due respect to the good [CHED] Chairman: if there are funds that were allocated for a purpose, yet were not spent to fulfill this purpose, then this is a case of mismanagement. It may look good on paper that the CHED did not spend P10 billion, but the real consequence of that is the Filipino people were short-changed P10 billion because it was not used to serve their needs,” added Daza.
In a recent hearing of the House Committee on Higher Education, Daza said the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) disclosed in 2019 they submitted to CHED a list of more than one million Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) students but only 7,000 were given support.
“Nakakadurog ng puso,” said Daza. [This is heartbreaking.]
He added that for this year, the DSWD said that over 700,000 more senior high school students under the 4Ps program are graduating [and], hopefully, venture into college or university.
“At the rate the CHED is going, I fear that not even one percent of these poor students will get support from the government.”
According to Daza, the country is facing a huge problem as its tertiary education dropout rate is 25 percent to 30 percent—among the highest in Asia.
“And we can’t completely blame it on the students because most of these are due to financial reasons,” he said.
“I have defended the budget of the CHED for the past couple of years, in the august halls of Congress, during those grueling yet important budget hearings. I fervently believe that the CHED is a key agency in giving the poor more opportunities to escape poverty, especially after it was empowered by RA 10931 (The Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act),” he added. “After seeing their underutilization of this budget–which also equates to, in my mind, a lack of compassion–I can’t help but regret taking up the cudgels for them in the House.”
Daza urged De Vera to find it “in his heart” to use the power and responsibility that he was given to answer the plight of the poor, underprivileged, and undereducated.
“He can implement creative solutions to reallocate the unspent funds to fill a dire need for those under the 4Ps; not just for their tuition fees but also for their needs in their daily lives as students. Let’s come together with the same lens, through the eyes of the poorest Filipinos. Yes, there are bureaucratic procedures and difficulties to hurdle. No one is in a better position to improve these procedures and provide for students whose futures should not be at risk because they have to work to live,” he said.
“My door is open to Chairman de Vera to find a way forward for the future Filipino. Let’s all be part of the solution,” Daza added.