The Philippine Online Chronicles

“I think they have to answer for this action because we are still a democratic country.”

These were the words of Commission on Higher Education (CHED) chair Emmanuel Angeles a day after protesting members of the Kabataan Party-list (Youth Party-list, or KPL) detached the gates and broke the glass entrance of the CHED headquarters in a protest rally against the proposed tuition increase in the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP).

Angeles said on the Philippine Daily Inquirer that the KPL members should be held liable for the damage they caused, allegedly amounting to more than half a million pesos.

“They behaved like uneducated people. They’re studying in universities but they’re acting as if they’re uneducated,” he said.

However, KPL Representative Raymond Palatino insisted that the protest actions were “not violent.”

“I won’t describe it as violent; nobody was hurt. It was a mere bold display of anger, disappointment, frustration... I understand where they are coming from,” Palatino said on Bulatlat.com.

Angeles earlier announced that CHED will not approve the proposed 2,000 percent tuition increase in PUP, as well the proposed increases in Dr. Espinosa Memorial State College of Agriculture and Technology in Masbate and Mindanao State University-Sulu.

He added that he will “convince” 290 private colleges and universities to defer their planned tuition increases. Tuition in private tertiary schools nationwide are deregulated under the Education Act of 1982.

Criminal charges

Meanwhile, five PUP students, including the incoming chairperson of the PUP Central Student Council (PUP-CSC), are facing charges of robbery after allegedly stealing “several [PUP] school supplies,” which included 13 desks, during a rally in the PUP campus last Wednesday, said GMANews.tv.

According to Sun Star, the five students have posted bail.

“We are confident that they will withdraw the charges they filed against us. They know that we are getting sympathies from different sectors and I know that they know they are just humiliating themselves," said PUP-CSC Chair Cheysser Soriano, who was charged by the Manila Police District along with Ferrin Louise Umagat, 19; Judy Anne Fabito, 19; Piem Canela, 18; and Abriel Mansilungan, 20.