Puerto Rico Ping! Please Freepmail me if you want on or off the list.
Posted on 05/05/2010 6:22:51 AM PDT by Ebenezer
Some 20 students and demonstrators, including a TV journalist, were forcibly removed from the University of Puerto Rico’s Río Piedras campus gate on Barbosa Avenue by Riot Police officers Tuesday morning while demonstrating against the institution’s refusal to negotiate solutions for the fiscal crisis affecting it.
During the incident, at least six students were injured, including journalist Mayra Acevedo, from Channel 6, and had to receive medical assistance.
“We were demonstrating on the lane that the police had already closed to traffic in front of the gate. People trying to get into the campus had to go through the students’ picket line,” said UPR Law School student Gabriel Camacho.
“All of a sudden, and without any notice, the Riot Police started pushing the students away from the gate,” added Camacho.
Acevedo, a veteran reporter for the government-owned Puerto Rico TV, was reporting the incident between the demonstrators and the Police when she and cameraman Luis Rolón were run over by the Riot Police squad. Acevedo received a blow on the side of her head from a police baton.
During the violent operative, a student who had been beaten on his face with a baton, took hold of a loudspeaker and started chanting, “negotiation not confrontation.” However, police continued to steamroll their way, pushing the students some 40 feet into the campus. The action prompted complaints of violation to the no confrontation policy enacted by Certification 90, which states that Police officers will not access campus grounds unless requested by UPR administrators and “only when life and property are at risk.”
Police Col. Leovigildo Vázquez later admitted that the officers “could have gone a few feet into the campus but it was not because university authorities had requested it.”
“We have not received any request from the chancellor to go into the campus,” said Vázquez.
In a written statement distributed to the press late Tuesday afternoon, Río Piedras campus Chancellor Ana Guadalupe denied any participation in the morning incident between the Riot Police and the students. The chancellor also denied accusations regarding her planning to allow the entrance of Riot Police squads to the campus to evict the striking students that have been occupying the premises for two weeks.
“They are false, irresponsible statements,” said Guadalupe about UPR’s Exempt and Non-Teaching Personnel Brotherhood President Wilberto Jiménez’s accusations.
Students deliver counterproposal
On Tuesday afternoon, members of the Student Negotiating Committee (SNC) handed their counterproposal to UPR president José R. De la Torre at his office at the Río Piedras Botanical Gardens.
In their counterproposal, the students reiterate the repealing of Certification 98 (affecting the tuition waiver program) and the need to standardize the cost of the summer sessions so the summer credit/hour costs the same as the regular semester credit/hours, informed SNC member Santiago Velázquez.
“The president assured us he would deliver the proposal to the Board of Trustees for their consideration,” said Vázquez.
According to the student leader, De la Torre said he would need until Thursday for the Trustees to evaluate the students’ proposal and get their reaction to it. The meeting is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Thursday, after the meeting of the Fiscal Efficiency Committee appointed by the Board of Trustees.
While the SNC met with the president, the theater group “Sembrando Consciencia” (Sowing Conscience) performed a theatrical protest at the entrance of the Botanical Gardens in which 12 actors dressed in black recreated the last days of late Argentine First Lady Eva Perón, “when supporters came to the her window to pray for the salvation of her soul,” said José Juan Pérez Velázquez, director of the group.
“We come here today to pray for the salvation of public university education and the possibility that the people of Puerto Rico can access that education,” said Pérez Velázquez.
During the performance, the actors cried and expressed their pain at the imminent loss of public university education and offered Riot Police officers flowers. Whenever one of the officers in the formation expressed any form of sympathy toward the protesters, the officer in charge would pull them out of the formation and replace them with another one.
Silent majority joins in
Standing at some distance from the demonstration, six members of the Silent Majority group — who had also called for a demonstration in front of the Botanical Gardens — looked on, apparently waiting their turn to protest. The group is asking the UPR administration to negotiate a solution to end the student strike so classes can restart.
Eduardo Náter, spokesperson for the group, reiterated that they agreed with the striking students’ demands, but disagreed with their methods.
The Silent Majority advocates for the end of the strike and returning to classes while negotiating with the administration a solution to the fiscal woes affecting the institution.
While speaking to the press, Náter was approached by Student Trustee elect René Vargas, who greeted and invited him to joined the protest in progress. Náter accepted Vargas’ invitation and joined the demonstration in front of the Botanical Gardens, along with some of his followers.
Dale macana, policía, dale macana.....
Over-organized.
Brotherhood members are responsible for the campus’ physical plant. I recall the quality of their work left much to be desired.
They will make the perfect 58th. State.
Puerto Rico Ping! Please Freepmail me if you want on or off the list.
Standing at some distance from the demonstration, six members of the Silent Majority group -- who had also called for a demonstration in front of the Botanical Gardens -- looked on, apparently waiting their turn to protest. The group is asking the UPR administration to negotiate a solution to end the student strike so classes can restart. Eduardo Nater, spokesperson for the group, reiterated that they agreed with the striking students' demands, but disagreed with their methods. The Silent Majority advocates for the end of the strike and returning to classes while negotiating with the administration a solution to the fiscal woes affecting the institution.
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