recent weeks, the UAAP Board stood pat on implementing the two-year residency requirement for high school transferees after a meeting yesterday.
According to reports, the meeting, which was held at the National University, took seven hours. In the end, nothing was changed as the Board chose to uphold its original decision to lengthen the residency period of high school players transferring from one member school to another from one to two years.
However, the UAAP said that it will come up with clearer explanatory rules on the application of the amendments to the rule.
“The UAAP board of trustees, at its annual board meeting, with all the member universities duly represented, voted to uphold its decision to impose the two-year residency requirement effective UAAP Season 76. The board is working on the explanatory rules on the application of the said residency requirement and will finalize the same within the month,” said the UAAP in its statement.
With this development, Cebuano star guard Jerie Marlon Pingoy, for whom many believe the rule was made for with his controversial transfer from Far Eastern University to Ateneo, will have to sit out two years before being able to suit up for the Blue Eagles.
Foreign players will also have to sit out for two years before getting the chance to play, which means former Southwestern University superstar Ben Mbala, who committed to join La Salle in the offseason, will play for the Green Archers in 2015.
Senator Pia Cayetano, a staunch critic of the new UAAP rules, vowed to fight the implementation to the very end. “I will not let this pass,” she said on her Twitter account. Last April 1, Cayetano brought several experts together with members of a UAAP panel to discuss the impact of the rule.