DBM: Use of P3-billion savings for Dengvaxia legal

MANILA, Philippines — The use of P3 billion in government savings for the procurement of the controversial dengue vaccine Dengvaxia during the Aquino administration was legal, officials of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said yesterday.

DBM lawyer Tricia Baraan told the House committees on good government and health that the 2015 budget law authorized the President to realign savings to any program or project undertaken by the executive branch.

She said this was the authority used by the Office of the President in releasing P3.5 billion to the Department of Health (DOH) for several programs, including P3 billion for the procurement of dengue vaccines.

Another DBM official, Assistant Director Jane Abella, said the released funds augmented the P3.2-billion appropriation for the DOH’s expanded immunization program.

“Under the budget law, an augmentation could be made to an existing appropriation. In this case, the existing appropriation was the P3.2 billion for the immunization program,” she said.

The two committees reopened their inquiry despite more than a year of hearings because the new chairman of the committee on good government and public accountability, Xavier Jesus Romualdo, wanted to “tie up some loose ends” in the results of the probe conducted by his predecessor, Johnny Pimentel of Surigao del Sur.

The good government committee is the lead panel in the inquiry. The House replaced Pimentel with Romualdo in August a day after the former submitted a draft report on the joint probe.

Baraan and Abella defended the legality of the use of savings in response to questions raised by Reps. Winston Castelo of Quezon City and Gabriel Bordado of Camarines Sur.

Castelo likened the Dengvaxia procurement to the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) of former president Benigno Aquino III and his budget secretary Florencio Abad.

“DAP, which the Supreme Court had declared as unconstitutional, also involved the use of government savings, which means that the utilization of savings for Dengvaxia procurement was likewise unconstitutional,” he said.

Baraan insisted that the Office of the President had the authority under the 2015 budget law to realign savings within the executive branch.

The same authority was given to the chief justice as head of the judiciary, and to the Senate president and speaker of the House of Representatives as leaders of the legislative department, she said.

Romualdo said even if the use of savings was legal, he found the tight timeline on the release of funds and the process of procuring Dengvaxia by the Philippine Children’s Medical Center (PCMC) to be “curious.”

“The funds were released on Dec. 29, 2015. The bidding process was started the following month even if the registration of Dengvaxia with the Food and Drug Administration was still pending. This showed that there was undue haste in the procurement of the vaccine,” he said.