Co-financed universities file a claim for unpaid State allocations

The Universidad del Azuay, together with the other Ecuadorian universities that receive state allocations to attend scholarships for low-income students, filed an action for noncompliance with the Constitutional Court due to the assignments that have not been delivered.  

The Constitution and the Law establish that the Ministry of Economy and Finance must transfer these allocations for the operation of the co-financed universities and the delivery of scholarships to low-income students in a timely manner and without delay or deprivation.

For this reason, on February 11 of this year, the co-financed universities filed a prior claim with the Minister of Economy and Finance, demanding compliance with the law, without having received a response to date, leading to this presentation before the Constitutional Court. .

This May 6, at a press conference, the Rector of the UDA, Francisco Salgado, accompanied by rectors and representatives of eight co-financed universities, provided the context in which this claim of the higher education houses takes place:

"Four out of every 10 Ecuadorian university students are in private universities, and in the specific case of the eight universities that are present today, we have approximately 150.000 students in our classrooms, of which, the third part, about 50.000 receive scholarships financed with contributions from the State ”.

Francisco Salgado was accompanied by rectors and representatives of the Catholic University of Ecuador - PUCE, the

Universidad Católica de Santiago de Guayaquil, Universidad Politécnica Salesiana, Universidad Laica Vicente Rocafuerte de Guayaquil, Universidad Católica de Cuenca, Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja and Universidad UTE.

The Rector of the UTE, Ricardo Hidalgo, recalled that the lack of state funds adds, in the critical economic situation of the universities, a large contraction in enrollment due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Mauro Toscanini, Rector of the Catholic University of Guayaquil, added that the demand is only for the part of the co-financing, “apart there is a strong debt of what is the return of the Value Added Tax (VAT) for three years; the situation is unsustainable ”.

For his part, Fernando Ponce, Rector of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador, concluded that the universities, in practice, have not left any student in the air, “from our own funds we maintain the scholarship hoping that one day the State will fulfill with your payments. "

The action for non-compliance before the Constitutional Court was prepared jointly by professors from the Universidad del Azuay José Chalco Salgado and Sebastián López Hidalgo.