NORTH COTABATO (Mindanao Examiner / June 12, 2012) – Filipino students held a rally in front of the University of Southern Mindanao in the town of Kabacan and demanded Manila to act on the soaring cost of education and on the declining share of basic social services in the national government coffers.
The protesters said they were dismayed over President Benigno Aquino’s inactions on the loudest cry of the populace for greater government spending on education and social services.
“Aquino seems to be playing deaf over the constant calls on tuition and other fee increases amidst rising drop-out rates and record high poverty and unemployment in the country and Aquino should be more sensitive enough to the current plight of the students and parents for many of them cannot afford to send their children to school due to skyrocketing of expenditures,” Jenifer Cardo, College Editors Guild of the Philippines-North Cotabato, said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.
She said there is still no remedy in the glaring shortages and underfunding on basic education despite Aquino’s continued boasting of the government’s K + 12 program that puts additional years in the elementary and high school education.
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