Siquijor solon hopes to convince DBM’s Diokno to support Bottom-Up-Budgeting

CEBU, Philippines - Siquijor Representative Rav Rocamora urged Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno to have an open mind over participatory budgeting, officially known as Bottom-Up-Budgeting (BuB).

Rocamora said he was hoping that he can convince Diokno to give his support for the continuation and institutionalization of the BuB, the funds of which are actually maximized because these projects were actually the product of consultation and deliberation with the target communities themselves.

“I hope we can convince Sec. Benjamin Diokno on the merits of BuB. At the very heart of this program is really people’s participation in government budgeting. It’s not a tool for patronage, and definitely not a waste of government money. Discontinuing it would be a bigger waste,” said Rocamora.

“Naiintindihan ko ang skepticism towards the program, but if we peel off the misconceptions about the BuB, it has a huge potential for and citizen’s participation and poverty reduction,” he said.

Rocamora noted that, beyond poverty reduction, the BuB was essential in bringing about social change by making the national budget process accessible to the public.

“At the very heart of BuB is the idea that government processes must be democratized. I believe it should be continued and in fact further strengthened. The program, like any government program, still needs to be perfected. But we cannot perfect it if we emasculate it,” the congressman said.

According to a resolution the National Anti-Poverty Commission–Sectoral Representative Council (NAPC-SRC), the BuB program had a total allocation of P74 billion, from 2013 to 2016, with a total of 54,951 projects.

For the fiscal year 2017, 1,633 LGUs were involved in preparing their local poverty reduction action plan or LPRAP with P35 billion in the proposed national budget.

Rocamora is the main author of Joint House Resolution No. 4, together with Representatives Tomasito Villarin, Carmelo Lazatin II, and Teddy Baguilat with more than 50 co-authors.

Rocamora has also authored HB No. 3429 or the Grassroots Participatory Budgeting Act to institutionalized participatory budgeting. —Contributed article (FREEMAN)