UNO to Arroyo: Invest more on education

MANILA, Philippines - The United Opposition (UNO) on Tuesday asked President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to invest more on education in order to improve its quality. "The reason the education sector in the Philippines is doing so poorly is because we are not investing enough in education," UNO spokesperson Adel Tamano said in a statement. Tamano, who is also president of the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila, reminded President Arroyo that the government is constitutionally mandated to prioritize education for the people. "The constitution mandates that the highest budgetary priority must be education but the reality is that the GMA administration spends only 16 percent of the budget on education and 56 percent on debt servicing. With priorities like that is it any wonder why our state universities and colleges are lagging behind our Asian neighbors," he said. Tamano cited that last May, a report published by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) pointed out that since the Arroyo administration came to power in 2001, all key performance indicators in education have floundered. He said the PCIJ’s published report noted that the percentage of schoolchildren, who reach up to grade six, is down from 75.9 percent in 2001 to 69.9 percent in 2006. The same report also showed that Elementary dropout rate in 2001 was 5.75 percent and increased to 7.36 percent in 2006. “Those who repeat a grade is also up, from 1.95 percent in 2001 to 2.89 percent in 2006. The Per capita spending for education in 1996 was pegged at P1,108. In 2006, it was P1,014. The figure was lower in 2005, at P975. In the last decade, the highest per capita spending for education was P1,337, in 1998,” Tamano quoted the PCIJ report as saying. - GMANews.TV