Sandinista deputy Wálmaro Gutiérrez, in the plenary of the National Assembly, argued that the State of Nicaragua cannot continue granting part of the constitutional 6% to universities that commercialize with education, in reference to the Central American University (UCA).
This Thursday, March 31, the reform to Law 582, General Law of Education and reform and addition to Law 89, Law of Autonomy of Higher Education Institutions was approved; with 75 votes from the Ortega deputies, 0 votes against, 14 abstentions and two present.
With this reform, the university campus of the UCA is outside the National Council of Universities (CNU) and thus justify the dispossession of part of the constitutional 6% that corresponds to it.
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In reference to the UCA, Gutiérrez expressed that “it doesn’t make sense” that with the taxes of Nicaraguans “resources are allocated to finance private universities.”
For the Sandinista deputy, “it is logical” that these resources be “reinvested” in other universities in Nicaragua, such as those on the Caribbean Coast, and he affirmed that private universities “have no right” to dispose of these resources.
“That they become mercantile companies and that they continue to manage education as a commodity, they are fully entitled here, private initiative is free, says the Constitution,” he attacked.
Also, alluding to the UCA, he maintained that the university is managed as a private asset and then money is requested from the “father of the State to continue doing his business (personal business”.
The National Assembly argued that this amendment to the Law is to strengthen the higher education subsystem and the CNU as its governing body.
With the reform of the legislation, the institutions of higher education are defined in accordance with the law “as well as the functions of the CNU in relation to the regulation of higher education, taking into account the human development policy, among others.”
In the proposal to reform Law 89, Law of Autonomy of Higher Education Institutions, article 56 states that among the state universities that make up the CNU as the governing body of the higher education subsystem are the following:
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National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, León (UNAN-León), National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, Managua (UNAN-Managua), National University of Engineering (UNI), National Agrarian University (UNA), National Polytechnic University (UNP) —formerly UPOLI —.
