
March 2010: Hundreds of students at Polytechnic University in Manila, the largest university in the Philippines, walked out of their classes to protest a proposed 2,000% tuition hike. They threw out dilapidated armchairs and desks from the balconies, piled them up in front of the main arts building and set them up in flames.
Campus rallies against SUC budget cuts presage rising tide of youth and people’s protests
By the Communist Party of the Philippines
,27 November 2010
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) salutes and supports the struggle of students and other school personnel of the University of the Philippines, the Polytechnic University of the Philippines, the Philippine Normal University and other state universities and colleges (SUCs) in Metro Manila and other regions against unjust SUC budget cuts.
The CPP hails the militancy and determination of the students, teachers and other school personnel in the mass protest actions they have launched the past two weeks. The CPP takes note of the widespread unity of students, teachers, administrative officials, non-academic workers and supporters against the US-Aquino regime’s SUC budget cuts. The broad united front against the budget cuts underscores the popular opposition to the ruling regime’s policy to cut state subsidies for SUCs and other direly needed social services, and concentrate the bulk of state spending for foreign debt servicing, military spending, privatization programs, “pork barrels” and the World Bank’s Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program for perpetual mendicancy.
The participation of several thousand students, academic and non-academic school personnel and other sectors in campus walkouts and other protest actions the past several days significantly mark a rising tide of mass protests against the US-Aquino regime’s antipeople policies.
These rallies in Philippine universities and colleges are taking place at the same time as students wage protest actions in unprecedented numbers in the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, some states in the U.S., and other countries where governments have carried out similar “austerity measures” resulting in brutal budget cuts in education and other necessary social spending. Continue reading →