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Republic Act 9500
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Senate Resolution No. 51
Friday, February 15, 2008
Senate Bill 1964
Friday, January 18, 2008
House Bill 2845
Friday, January 18, 2008
Update on the U.P. CHARTER
Thursday, October 5, 2006
UP President Emerlinda R. Roman
Senate Bill 1833
Thursday, October 5, 2006
House Bill 5008
Thursday, October 5, 2006
Update on the U.P. CHARTER
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
UP President Emerlinda R. Roman
[ Download free PDF READER here ]
UP Charter: 20 years and counting
Compiled by Jo. Florendo B. Lontoc
Here, in detail, is a timeline of milestones in the efforts to revise the UP Charter.
1982 - President Edgardo J. Angara creates a Code Commission tasked to propose revisions to the University Code and the Charter. The Commission eventually prepares a written report, but is constrained by recognition that Congress and Malacañang intervention will be invoked in the process of changing the UP Charter.
Dr. Jose V. Abueva
November 1987 – A multi-sectoral ad hoc committee is formed to assist newly-installed UP President Jose V. Abueva and the BOR in the review and rewriting of the UP Charter, composed of representatives from faculty, students, and non-academic personnel who constitute a preparatory body for a “Charter Study Commission” set to be formed in the next year.
August 16, 1990 - Senator Wigberto Tañada, with Senators Butz Aquino, Leticia Ramos Shahani, Heherson Alvarez, and Vic Ziga, file a resolution “urging the appropriate Senate committee to conduct an inquiry to review the Charter of the UP and for other purposes.”
c. 1991 - Consultations are made under the University-wide Democratization Movement (WIDEM).
October 1991 - UP WIDEM meets, resolves that the UP Charter be reviewed, and provides concept papers.
9th Congress
c. 1992 to early 1993 - Senator Ramos-Shahani introduces Senate Resolution No. 561. Senator Tañada introduces Senate Resolution No. 578, both aimed at conducting a review of the UP Charter. Senate Committee on Education, Culture, and the Arts adopts both resolutions.
August 1992 - UP President Jose V. Abueva creates the Charter Review Committee (CRC) as a result of WIDEM consultations, with Dr. Ledivina Cariño as chair and Francisco Nemenzo and Raphael Lotilla as members. The UP Diliman Council Meeting discusses and defines the tasks the Committee. Abueva orders Charter Study Groups (CSGs) to be formed in all UP units.
October 1992 - KASAMA (Student councils of UP campuses) Conference discusses Charter issues.
October 1992 - January 1993 – The CRC and CSGs in small meetings review related materials, with faculty members giving their views on the process and substance of Charter revision.
January 1993 - The CRC asks units/organizations to create CSGs.
January 27, 1993 – Vice President for Public Affairs Ledivina Cariño, who heads the CRC, issues a memorandum inviting University constituents to participate in drafting the new Charter.
February 1993 - Pamantasang Asemblea (UP Manila) submits proposed Charter changes; CRC meets with Public Administration-CSG; Integrated School CSG also formed.
March 1993 - CRC asks units/organizations to call general assembly and form CSGs, and provides them with a more systematic process for review. Five more CSGs are formed this month.
May 1993 - Institute of Biology submits proposals.
Dr. Emil Q. Javier
June 1993 - Dr. Emil Q. Javier, as presidential nominee, includes Charter Review in his vision paper.
August 1993 - Faculty and student groups demand review/revision of Charter following the selection of the new UP President. The Senate Committee on Education, Culture and Arts initiates a review of Charter. UP College Baguio forms another CSG.
August 1993 - Senator Tañada files Senate Resolution No. 593 (directing the Senate Committee on Education, Arts, and Culture to review the UP Charter or Act No. 1870 for possible amendments ).
August 6, 1993 - Newly appointed UP President Javier takes his oath amid student protests. Violence prompts Senate inquiry into the selection of UP President, and ultimately into the UP Charter.
September 1, 1993 - President Javier issues Memo No. 93-50A, directing grassroots, multi-sectoral Charter review process.
September 21, 1993 - To give way to more consultations, President Javier requests postponement of the first Senate hearing scheduled on October 1, 1993.
December 1993 - Senator Tañada presents bill to change the University charter along lines proposed by UP WIDEM.
December 20, 1993 - Senator Tañada files Senate Bill No. 15[8]0. He proposes the substitution of the BOR with the University System Assembly (USA) as the highest policy-making body in the University.
1994 – The CRC holds meetings with autonomous universities soliciting comments to provisions of the draft charter being proposed.
January 1994 - UP forms a new CRC to deliberate Senator Tañada’s bill, Senate Bill No. 1580 (An Act Revising the Charter of the UP System).
January 12, 1994 - Representative Feliciano Belmonte files House Bill No. 11711, which contains essentially the same provisions as Senate Bill No. 15[8]0.
Senator Ernesto Maceda files a Senate Bill (An Act Deleting from the Board of Regents [BOR] of the UP the Secretary of Education, Culture, & Sports as its ex-officio chairman and the respective chairmen of the two committees on education of the Senate and House of Representatives as members).
February 1994 - Kasama (UP student councils) supports the Tañada Bill.
February 3, 1994 - The Senate Committee on Education, Arts, and Culture conducts its first public hearing on the review of the UP Charter. The Senate holds a public hearing on Senator Shahani’s resolution on the role of the UP Charter in conflicts in the University, and the Maceda bill removing the chairs of the Senate and House committees on education from the Board of Regents.
Around this time, the CRC receives 17 written comments from units and individuals in UP Diliman since August 1992.
February 14, 1994 - Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. endorses House Bill No. 11711 filed by Rep. Belmonte.
February 1994 - The CRC intensifies efforts to prepare for the next Senate public hearing. It begins reviewing comments and suggestions submitted by various units on the Tañada Bill.
August 18, 1994 - Committee on National Policies and Programs presents to University Council of Diliman Draft Charter substantially similar to draft of System CRC.
August 24, 1994 - The CRC meets to draft its version of the new UP Charter, taking into consideration the bills filed by Senator Tañada and Rep. Belmonte.
September 23, 1994 - The CRC, head-ed by VP Cariño, finalizes its draft of the proposed Charter. It will be the University’s proposed Charter in the coming Congressional hearings. “[T]he draft charter retains the BOR but alters its composition by appointing the Chairperson of the Commission on Higher Education as head of the BOR, adding a Regent to represent the non-teaching staff, making the Faculty and Student Regents direct choices of their respective constituencies, reducing to three the number of Malacañang-appointed Regents but increasing their term to three years, and decreasing the total membership of the BOR to eleven. Another feature of the CRC-proposed charter is the creation of a System University Council which will become the highest academic body of the University. The proposed charter also ensures the University’s “institutional and fiscal autonomy” through exemptions from taxes and recognition of UP as a “closed career system,” thus giving it the power to set standards on personnel recruitment, appointments, promotions, and compensation plans.
The CRC-proposed charter is based on the suggestions made by the University Council on the existing Charter and on the position papers on the Tañada bill from the different colleges of the four autonomous UP units.
September 24, 1994 - University Council of Diliman approves the draft charter on motion of Prof. Francisco Nemenzo.
c. September 1994 to February 1996 - The draft charter undergoes refinement through consultation and input from University units. By February 1996, President Javier is ready to present the draft charter to Congress.
January 26, 1995 - BOR discusses draft Charter and creates a Regents’ ad hoc committee to study the proposal.
10th Congress
July 11, 1995 - President Javier issues Memo 95-72 containing a draft resolution to create a System University Council.
July 22, 1995 - UP Diliman University Council discusses the proposed System University Council.
December 1, 1995 - VP Cariño writes a memo to President Javier incorporating into the draft Charter the proposals to change SUC powers and functions, based on suggestions from University Councils.
February 13, 1996 - The Senate sets a public hearing on the draft Charter submitted by President Javier in lieu of Senate Bill No. 187 sponsored by Senator Vicente Sotto. The hearing does not push through.
November 12, 1996 - Reps. Belmonte, Manuel Villar Jr., and Joaquin Chipeco introduce a draft UP charter to the House Committee on Education. Forty other congressmen, mostly UP alumni, signify their support of the bill.
February 12, 1997 - House Committee on Education chaired by Rep. and UP Regent Jose C. Lacson approves HB 6541/4893 “An Act to Enhance the Academic Freedom and Institutional Autonomy of the UP” sponsored by Reps. Belmonte Jr., Villar Jr., and Chipeco Jr.. Main feature: System University Council, non-teaching staff representation in the BOR, power of BOR to fix and adjust salaries.
Summer of 1998 - 10th Congress adjourns with neither Congress nor Senate passing a bill on the UP charter.
11th Congress
11th Congress - Representatives Dante Liban and Belmonte file a bill based on UP-proposed revised Charter circulated in the different campuses.
February 1999 - Representatives Belmonte and Liban file House Bill 6737.
August 5, 1999 - Dr. Javier steps down as UP president, his term spanning the 9th, 10th, and 11th Congress, without seeing the new Charter being passed in both Houses.
Prof. Francisco Nemenzo
August 6, 1999 - Prof. Francisco Nemenzo assumes UP presidency, begins to write alumni congressmen and senators asking for their cooperation to have the new UP Charter bill passed.
1999 – Liban-Belmonte version undergoes few changes, principally the abolition of the provision on the establishment of a University Senate and a more explicit and extended definition of “national university.”
Summer of 2001 - 11th Congress adjourns with neither Congress nor Senate passing a bill on the UP charter.
12th Congress
12th Congress - At the House, UP alumni Aniceto Saludo and Rolex Suplico, and non-alumni Harlin Abayon and Antonio Nachura file HB 455 and see it through to the third and final reading at the House.
December 2002 - The House of Representatives approves House Bill 455, sponsored by Rep. Antonio Nachura, on third and final reading.
April 22, 29, and May 16, 2003 - The Senate Committee on Education conducts public hearings on the UP Charter. The first two are held at the Senate and the third, at UP Diliman, to bring the issue “closer to home.”
April 22, 2003 - Preliminary hearings on the Charter start in the Senate, with Sen. Francis Pangilinan filing Senate Bill 1886.
May 2003 - Several officials and units of UPM and PGH express their support of selected provisions of SB 1886.
May 12, 2003 - UPD Council Executive Committee writes statement of sup-port for HB 455 and SB 1886 (with the incorporation of Section 24 of SB 437).
May 13, 2003 - UPLB Executive Committee passes resolution to support UP Charter change.
May 16, 2003 - Senate Committee on Education holds public hearing in UP Diliman at Claro M. Recto Hall. After which, the proposed revisions are submitted for floor deliberations.
May 23, 2003 - Chancellor Ricardo de Ungria writes Senator Villar expressing UPMin’s appeal for HB 455, as amended by the Technical Working Group of the Senate committee, to be enacted.
June 3, 2003 - Senate Committee on Education acting chair Francis Pangilinan introduces SB 2587 (“An Act Strengthening the University of the Philippines as the National University”) during a Senate plenary session. SB 2587 is the consolidated version of at least six bills filed by Senate President Franklin M. Drilon (SB 437) and Senators Sergio Osmeña III (SB 1783), Loren Legarda-Leviste (SB 1868), Pangilinan (SB 1886), Edgardo J. Angara (SB 1955), and Manuel B. Villar (SB 2299).
June 5, 2003 - Congress adjourns; deliberation on SB 2587 is moved to July when Congress resumes.
July 19, 2003 - Several UPD student councils express support of SB 2587 “through alternative provisions.”
August 18-19, 2003 - Interpellations at the third reading of SB 2587 involving issues of BOR composition, tuition rates, and admission are presented.
September 2, 2003 - SB 2587 under-goes further interpellation on third reading. The Senate President suggests revisions to stipulate limitations of BOR powers, in response to fears of commercialization.
November 4, 2003 - Makati City Council passes resolution fully supporting and endorsing SB 2587.
c. 2003-2004 - UPV faculty and staff resolve to support House-approved UP Charter and SB 1886.
February 6, 2004 - UP Charter bill fails to be voted on when the Senate adjourns its session.
March 2004 - Sen. John Osmeña interpellation puts SB 2587 on hold. Bill fails to pass first reading in the Senate.
March 4, 2004 - Sen. Osmeña publishes a full-page paid advertisement in the Philippine Daily Inquirer accusing Nemenzo of overstaying in office and the UP itself of failing in its mission to serve all Filipinos.
March 11, 2004 - UP Alumni Association resolves to condemn Sen. Osmeña’s “unprincipled treatment” of SB 2587 and President Nemenzo.
13th Congress
September 9, 2004 - The Senate Committee on Education, Arts and Culture and the Committees on Ways and Means and Finance hold public hearings on the UP Charter at the Claro M. Recto Room of the Senate.
September 2004 – Bayan Muna Rep. Teodoro Casiño and Rep. Liza Maza file HB 2327, “An Act Reorienting the University of the Philippines as the Premier State University” for a charter “that will allow for full participation of all sectors and interest groups in the UP community in the selection of their leaders,” Maza says, “and to protect the University from the threat of commercialization and privatization.”
September 16, 2004 - Senate holds public hearings on the UP Charter.
October 7, 2004 - A Technical Working Group holds meeting no. 2 to work out another draft of the UP Charter.
October 26, 2004 - The Senate committees on Education, Arts and Culture; Ways and Means; and Finance submit SB 1833 as substitute for SBs 221 (Osmeña III), 566 (Villar Jr.), 1066 (Angara), 1106 (Drilon), 1334 (Recto), 1399 (Pangilinan), 1739 (J. Ejercito), and 1827 (Gordon).
First session, 13th Congress - Interpellations by Senators and responses are made by UP during deliberations on Committee Report 2.
November 2, 2004 - Interpellating Senate Majority Leader Pangilinan, Senator Miriam Santiago warns she will “filibuster for six years” against the passage of the UP bill until she gets a satisfactory explanation from UP officials on the alleged anomalous admission system at the UP College of Law.
November 3, 2004 - Senator Santiago withdraws her objection to the proposal to classify UP as national university and allows it to lease idle lands. At the same time she demands that UP surrender the names and addresses of the members of the Admissions Committee that denied entry to her son into the UP College of Law, before Nov. 15.
November 8, 2004 – President Nemenzo responds to questions by Sen. Santiago through a letter addressed to Senate President Drilon, agreeing that questions addressed to her son may have indeed been “injurious” and assures her of UP’s revision of admissions policies.
Dr. Emerlinda R. Roman
Late 2004 to February 2005 - Search process for UP President ends with the selection of Dr. Emerlinda R. Roman.
April 2005 - In a memo to Chancellors and Deans, President Emerlinda Roman calls for consultations in the UP community on certain issues being raised in the legislature concerning the new charter, particularly SB 1833 and a new House version from the Committee on Higher and Technical Education. The issues include a proposal by Sen. Sergio Osmeña III to establish an oversight committee to review the UP’s financial transactions, particularly relating to landholdings; the proposal from Sen. Santiago to allow siblings of UP alumni to enter the University without entrance examination, to include a provision against abuse of admissions procedures, and to distinguish academic freedom from “administrative procedural due process”; and the proposal by Sen. Manuel Roxas III for the removal of the corporate powers of the University. At the House, provisions include the substitution of “premier state university” for “national university,” consultative assemblies, and the adoption of measures to enable students and faculty members “to exercise established religious beliefs consistent with accepted norms and morals of society.”
May 17, 2005 - House Committee on Ways and Means, led by Rep. Jesli Lapus, sets a public hearing of an “unnumbered substitute bill to House Bill Nos. 3169, 597 (Escudero), 880 (Roque Ablan Jr.), 993 (Miguel Zubiri), 1587 (Eduardo Zialcita), 2110 (Eduardo Veloso), 2327 (Teodoro Casiño, Liza Maza, Satur Ocampo, Joel Virador, Crispin Beltran, Rafael Mariano), 2752 (Cynthia Villar), 3180, 3305 to strengthen the UP as the Premier State University.” The bill will be later named HB 5008, (The University of the Philip-pines Charter of 2005), 13th Congress, First Regular Session, introduced by Hons. Abayon, Villar, Escudero, Ablan, Zubiri, Zialcita, Veloso, Casiño, Maza, Tañada, Chatto, Ocampo, Virador, Mariano, Beltran, Petilla, Susano, Gullas, Macarambon, Magsaysay E., Villanueva, Teves, Andaya Jr., Baterina, Datumanong, Lacson, Cua, Singson, Tomauis, Cayetano, Vicencio, Sapiro.
January 18, 2006 - Per Committee Re-port 1301, the House Committees on Higher Education, Appropriations, and Ways and Means submit HB 5008 for floor deliberations. HB passes second reading.
2006-summer of 2007 – Period of questions and answers by legislators and University resource persons.
June 4, 2007 - Late in the day, the bicameral conference committee finishes reconciling the House and Senate versions (HB 5008 and SB 1833) of the UP Charter bill.
June 5, 2007 - Senate ratifies the newly reconciled UP Charter bill. The new Charter will allow the exemption of UP from SSL, tax exemptions of donations and revenues used solely for educational purposes, greater autonomy by removing Malacañang’s power to appoint the UP president and other sectoral representatives, power of BOR to approve and enter into contracts such as joint ventures, long-term leases, and sales. Contracts worth more than P50 million would require a 2/3 vote of the board; less, only a majority vote. It provides safeguards in the utilization and disposition of UP land and other assets such as the creation of an independent trust committee to advise the BOR on such investments.
June 5, 2007 - Senate Panel Chair Pangilinan announces that “the UP Charter Act has been approved by the bicameral conference. We adopted the Senate version with slight wordings from the House version.”
June 5, 2007 - The House adjourns without ratifying the reconciled UP Charter bill, citing quorum problems. As of 7:17 p.m., the House was declared adjourned when only 101 of 230 congressmen answered the roll call.
(Culled from UPSIO clippings of UP Newsletter (UPN), UP Newsbriefs, Forum, Philippine Collegian, and daily broadsheets; and documents provided to UPSIO by the Office of the Secretary of the University and the Board of Regents and other UP System offices including minutes of Senate hearings, and draft Senate and House bills, UP-Congress correspondence, and statements of support. UPN interviewed Vice President for Legal Affairs Atty. Marvic Leonen on Aug. 14, 2007 to explain some gaps in the time line.)
Caption: President Jose V. Abueva (1987 - 1993), President Emil Q. Javier (1993-1999), President Francisco Nemenzo (1999-2004), President Emerlinda R.Roman (2004 - present), Sen. Francis Pangilinan answers interpellations with resource persons Francisco Nemenzo, Emerlinda Roman, and other UP officials during a Senate en banc session in 2004.
Republic Act 9500
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Senate Resolution No. 51
Friday, February 15, 2008
Senate Bill 1964
Friday, January 18, 2008
House Bill 2845
Friday, January 18, 2008
Update on the U.P. CHARTER
Thursday, October 5, 2006
UP President Emerlinda R. Roman
Senate Bill 1833
Thursday, October 5, 2006
House Bill 5008
Thursday, October 5, 2006
Update on the U.P. CHARTER
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
UP President Emerlinda R. Roman
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