JEDDAH, 27 December 2002 — International Philippine School, Jeddah (IPSJ), which reopens after winter vacation on Jan. 6, proposes to hold election of members to its new management board by January-end.

“Although the school is determined to hold the election by January 30, it is subject to the financial review committee completing its task, which we hope it will be able to do so before the set deadline,” Philippine Consul General Kadatuan Usop told Arab News on Tuesday.

An assembly of parents is being convened in early January, in any case before Jan. 14, to set the criteria for election of seven members to the school board of management.

He said the two interim committees — one, six-member independent administration committee, chaired by Dr. Amilbahar Matingka, and the other six-member independent finance committee chaired by Fidel Hernandez, who also heads the current interim management board, were constantly interacting with parents and briefing them about the committee’s tasks and progress.

“The whole exercise is aimed at restoring normalcy and solvency of the school before a new board is elected by parents,” the consul general said.

The administration committee includes Mustapha Glang, Mokalid Diagao, Albert Pecson, Ross Vallesteros and Ramon Soriano. The finance committee includes Nenita Gomez and four other members.

“Once the financial committee completes its task, we propose to introduce an appropriate financial control system, which is lacking, and possibly come up with a comprehensive package so that the school can be put on the track for a new foundation for achieving stability and restructuring of academic standard that had suffered the most during the three-year term of the previous board of trustees,” Usop added.

The consul general said he intervened to assume charge of the school in response to a mandate from the Manila-based inter-ministerial committee (IMC) that oversees international schools worldwide. “The mandate I’ve received is for reviewing the administration and financial aspects of the school and make its working normal and solvent,” he said, alleging that the previous BOT had during the past three years “made the school insolvent to the extent that it had no funds to pay its building rent and teachers’ salaries”.

Once the criteria are laid down, the election will be held under the supervision of an official representative of the IMC who will specially come from the Philippines, a representative each of the country’s embassy in Riyadh and consulate in Jeddah, a representative of the Ministry of Education and three representatives from among parents, he said.

Third force concerns

Meanwhile, Nilo Lucena, vice president of the school’s Parent-Teacher Council (PTC) and president of Grade 3 (elementary) level of the Parents & Teachers Group (PTG), and spokesman for the “third force”, says the group he represents, which is distinct from that represented by Efren Rodriguez, chairman of the outgoing BOT, and Fidel Hernandez, who heads the present interim management board, has been supportive of the consul general’s initiative to restore normalcy at the school.

“While we welcome the proposed assembly of parents, we suggest that an MOE representative should be present at the meeting in order to give it legitimacy. We don’t want a repetition of the Oct. 11 incident when the proposed assembly was aborted and the gathering dispersed by the authorities.”

Speaking about the election, Lucena said, “our position right from the beginning is that a legitimate election should be held under the MOE supervision.”

This is in the context of MOE Foreign Education Director Mansour Ghazali’s statement that both the outgoing board of Rodriguez and the present interim board of Hernandez are disqualified from running in the forthcoming election,” he added.

The proposed assembly and election should be initiated jointly by the MOE and the Consulate to provide legitimacy to the incoming elected board. “One of the main concerns is that the elected board has to sign an undertaking with the MOE, which is a normal procedure with regard to all international schools. Our main concern in the upcoming assembly is the presence of non-parents and, of course, the security and safety of all parents. So the assembly should have the presence of local authorities,” Lucena added.