MY TWO CENTS’ – Why are we not angry for Jessiven?

This country prides itself with high functional literacy rates (88.7% for women and 84.2% for men, per the Philippine Statistics Authority). Functional literacy simply means the capability to read, count, and write. This is necessary for participating in the workforce and obtaining gainful employment. It is neither a reflection of leadership skills nor of entrepreneurial drive. It simply means being able to work.
But news from last week was particularly distressing.
Jessiven Lagatic was a fourth year student at Central Bicol State University of Agriculture who committed suicide on Thursday, February 11, reportedly due to a loss of his scholarship, which forced him and his family to fork out P7,000 to the school in place of the lost scholarship — something that may have been too much for the family to bear as a cost. To many netizens on Facebook and twitter, agonizing over P7,000 may sound irrelevant as a family Sunday buffet lunch in Manila’s posh hotel restaurants, but to those like him and his family in the rural areas it means a debt that may have to be paid over a long period of time.
How this government allowed such a mindset of despair to take root in the brain of a talented youngster speaks of plain arrogance, as it has allowed schools through the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) to continually raise fees for students. Five years of Daang Matuwid has failed to arrest the high cost of education and failed to inspire Jessiven out of his despair. Are we going to have more of this? Have we been so desensitized into our own cubbyholes that we fail to be indignant that such outcomes still happen?
In his proclamation rally speech, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte famously exclaimed that he cusses and curses because he is angry for us. Why call a presidential candidate a clown simply for being angry at things that we rightfully need to be angry at? Even Jesus Christ expressed his righteous anger at the vendors who were turning the temple into a marketplace. It is justifiable anger because the system and sanctuary of faith had been desecrated by the selfish desire, just as our education system has been relegated to a lucrative proposition for many of our business conglomerates. While the other presidential candidates promise scholarships and other benefits for the deserving, only Duterte has so far called for the lasting and thorough and frank solution – not to rely on available scholarships alone, but to remove the unjust and oppressive high price of education by lowering its cost through state subsidies or programs to lower costs.
Jessiven’s fate is worth cussing for.