Northern Samar Rep. Paul Daza on Wednesday sought an audit of the P10.3 billion fund earmarked for the free tuition and living allowance of thousands of poor tertiary level students enrolled in state universities and colleges (SUCs) and in private higher educational institutions (HEIs).
This was in response to complaints by the Association of Higher Education Institution (AHEI) in Region 12, against the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) for non-payment of scholarships under the Unified Student Financial Assistance System for Tertiary Education or UniFAST, which is in charge of implementing Republic Act 10931 to ensure that all eligible Filipinos get access to adequate and equitable education.
The P10.3 billion is part of the Higher Education Development Fund (HEDF) allocated to CHED. The fund came from the earnings of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor), Professional Regulation Commission (PRC), and travel tax.
“Those are earmarked funds by law and cannot be used outside of its specified purpose,” Daza said. He added if the said amount is not used it would just stay idle at the National Treasury.
At the same time, Daza called on President Marcos to order a review of the performance of CHED pertaining to education standard, enrolment and graduation rates and drop rates, among others.
“I am really disappointed with CHEd. The President probably should order an internal review of the CHEd’s performance, the attrition rate, dropout rate of Filipino students,” Daza said as he expressed dismay on reports that dropout rate is at 30 to 40 percent a year or only 60 students were able to graduate out of 100 who enrolled.
“You have P10 billion but you don’t use it, I suspect there is a hidden agenda. That should be reviewed and investigated by the Commission on Audit and Malacañang,” the solon added.
Under the UniFAST program, scholars are to be provided P30,000 per semester for tuition fee and living allowance. CHEd is supposed to remit the funding to the SUCS or local universities and colleges (LUCS), and in the absence of SUCs and LUCs in some areas, to private HEIs.
According to Agapito Lubaton, AHEI president and chief executive officer of the Marvelous College in Koronadal City, CHEd’s total unpaid dues for school year 2021-2023 amounted to P2.1 billion.
They also complained that just recently, CHEd suddenly changed the guidelines that the so-called “listahan 3.0” of the Department of Social and Welfare Development (DSWD) would be used as basis, which resulted in the inclusion of only very few scholars for school year 2022-2023 up to the present.
“Many schools suffer because while waiting for payment students still attend school without paying their school fees,” said Lubaton, adding that in his school, out of 1,800 aspiring grantees only 36 were taken as scholars because of the new guidelines.
The hearing conducted last year by the House Committee on Appropriation and Committee on Higher and Technical Education Chairman Popoy De Vera said they have no funds to pay schools.
But on Aug. 14, 2023, Rep. Mark Go directed the CHEd to pay all its scholarship debts to students, and told it to use the P10.3 billion HEDF to pay for its accountability.
CHEd was given one week to comply from the date of the hearing of August 2023. The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) was also instructed to act on it immediately.
On Sept. 22, 2023, CHEd paid in part the student fee of P10,000, but allowance was not paid yet to date.