Finding truth is La Salle’s concern

De La Salle University-Manila executive vice president Dr. Carmelita Quebengco said yesterday the school’s priority is to get to the bottom of the case involving an academically ineligible player and the possibility of a University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) suspension is not an immediate concern.

Quebengco said a four-man committee has been formed by La Salle to determine the culpability of a senior basketball player who was able to gain varsity eligibility using a fabricated Philippine Educational Placement Test (PEPT) certificate from the Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS).

The player saw action for La Salle the last three UAAP seasons. No La Salle official has divulged the identity of the player in question but sources said he is 6-5 center Mark Benitez.

La Salle representative to the UAAP Board Lito Tanjuatco, a member of the four-man committee, assured there will be no whitewash nor witchhunt in arriving at the truth. He said because the school volunteered the information of playing an academically ineligible student, the case is different from the Marlou Aquino incident where Adamson was suspended for a year because of complicity in the scam. Aquino’s grades were found to be tampered in his Adamson transcript when attempting to transfer to the University of the East.

The La Salle player in question has been summoned by the committee twice for a meeting but has not shown up.

"The committee wants to talk to him," she continued. "Technically, we cannot compel a player who is academically ineligible to appear before the committee. But we want to hear his side. The committee is ready to call on others who may shed light on this issue. We are asking the committee to complete its investigation and submit its findings as soon as possible."

Quebengco admitted she spoke to the player after La Salle lost Game 2 to Far Eastern University in the UAAP finals last Oct. 6. Earlier that day, La Salle director of sports development Bro. Roberto Casignal wrote UAAP president Fr. Max Rendon of Adamson to inform him that "the eligibility of one of our men’s basketball players is subject to serious question."

In the letter to Fr. Rendon, Bro. Casingal said "While we are prepared to continue playing, we also deem it proper to advise you about this serious matter so you can guide us accordingly."

The written confirmation from the DECS of the player’s spurious PEPT certificate came the next day. Because of the confirmation, Quebengco said La Salle would’ve forfeited Game 3 if the Archers won Game 2.

In 2002, the player flunked his first PEPT test in May but passed his second test in November.

"When I asked the player about his PEPT certificate, he was surprised," she related. "He was taken aback. I could sense it from the way he reacted. I told him if he did nothing wrong, we would help him with his education."

Quebengco said with the nullification of his PEPT certificate, the player’s collegiate credits the last three years will be erased. She said La Salle would be ready to assist the player in finishing his high school education and later going to college.

Quebengco said the DECS confirmed that in its listing of PEPT results, the player was evaluated to be qualified for third year high school. In his PEPT certificate submitted to La Salle, the document indicated he was qualified as a fourth year high school graduate.

The player reportedly said he did not pick up his PEPT certificate from the DECS but somebody else, not connected to La Salle, got the document and submitted it to the admissions office.

Quebengco denied the speculation that La Salle came out in the open about the ineligible player because he was on the verge of being exposed.

"That’s not true," she said. "We’ve never received any communication to that effect and even the UAAP Board was surprised by our announcement. If we didn’t bring this up, nobody would’ve known. This is all about transparency and honesty. If we can’t be honest about it, how do we teach honesty to our students? We look at this case from an educational perspective because we are shaping the young. If we don’t uphold our standards, the quality of our education will be diluted. We believe sports is an integral part of student development and that’s why we put a lot of importance to this issue. We are strict when it comes to dealing with cheating. If you’re caught, you fail and if it’s case of blatant cheating, you’re dismissed."

Quebengco said a prominent school brought up the incidence of spurious hand-carried DECS certificates at a recent meeting of university registrars and it led La Salle to look into the authenticity of similar documents.

La Salle brought some eight hand-carried documents to the DECS for verification and one was found to be fake. The spurious document was the player’s. The matter was brought to Quebengco’s attention and La Salle system president Bro. Armin Luistro called for a meeting to take up the case last Oct. 5. The confirmation of the fraudulent document from the DECS came through an undersecretary two days later.

"The manual of regulations for private schools does not require a school to verify PEPT documents prior to student admission," she noted. "In the meeting of registrars where fake documents were brought up, the subject was hand-carried fake graduate transcripts. That prompted us to voluntarily verify all hand-carried documents and on our own, we included the PEPT certificates."

Quebengco said she has no knowledge of other UAAP schools verifying PEPT certificates. "I was told by the DECS the verification process takes time because it isn’t computerized," she added.

Quebengco said the school is now reviewing its policies and procedures in screening admissions documents. She did not discount the possibility of reprimanding certain school officials but said it is not a usual practice in any educational institution to suspect that a DECS document is fake and must be verified.