2019 budget hangs as House illegally inserts more ‘pork’

The House of Reps continues to pad the 2019 national budget with congressional pork barrels, senators discovered. That’s why the budget remains unsent for presidential signature a month after enactment.

Senate President Tito Sotto exposed Saturday P79-billion pork realigned by House leaders after the P3.8-trillion budget was ratified Feb. 28. Sen. Ping Lacson earlier bared P11-billion pork belatedly being itemized by the House appropriations committee to anesthesize it.

The exposés bring to P90 billion the additional pork that congressmen are divvying up for personal use after the budget passage.

The new P90 billion is separate from the P305-billion pork that Lacson unearthed before budget approval.

Meaning, the P3.8-trillion budget contains P395 billion, or more than 10 percent, in pork. A national budget must be only for personnel salaries, maintenance and operations, capital expenses, and debts.

Pork barrels usually are wasted in lawmakers’ pet projects. The projects are for self-aggrandizement, “epal” in colloquial Filipino.

Kickbacks of 20-80 percent also are derived from pork-funded projects. Although prohibited, lawmakers pick the contractors or suppliers with whom they have devious agreements.

The Supreme Court outlawed pork barrels in 2013. It defined pork as: (1) lump-sum or (2) post-enactment congressional insertions into the budget, and (3) similar funds concocted via grave abuse of discretion.

Three senators and a dozen congressmen have been indicted for plunder of their pork allocations.

The new pork that Lacson discovered was P11 billion inserted by congressmen into the Health Facilities Enhancement Program, for public hospital equipment procurement. The fund originally was only P4 billion.

After budget enactment, Lacson said, congressmen aligned with deposed Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez cried to him that their P11 billion was being taken away. They purportedly were to get P8 million each, but new Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was redistributing it – P25 million each to her faction mates.

Arroyo has denied it. But House appropriations chairman Rolando Andaya said he was only itemizing the P11 billion that congressmen had proposed.

Lacson said Andaya is trying to skirt the SC’s first two definitions of pork – lump sum and post-enactment funds –but forgets that there’s still grave abuse of discretion.

(During Arroyo’s presidency, 2001-2010, Andaya was her budget secretary. The first month of her speakership, Aug. 2018-Jan. 2019, Andaya was her majority leader.)

Worse pork insertions are being made in the public works budget, Lacson quoted the disgruntled congressmen as confiding.

Sotto did not specify for what expenses the P79 billion he exposed would go. He said it was reported to him by the Senate’s Legislative Budget Research and Monitoring Office. The LBRMO is coordinating with the House when the 2019 budget can be transmitted for President Rody Duterte’s signature.

Lacson said the printing of the budget should have taken only ten days from passage, but has been delayed for a month at the House. Normally the House and Senate strive to enact the annual budget by early Dec. of the previous year.

The P305-billion pork that Lacson earlier exposed consists of

• P2.4 billion for Arroyo and P1.9 billion for Andaya’s districts alone;

• P2.4 billion to P8 billion that Andaya admitted was for a hundred other congressmen;

• P60 million each for 195 other congressmen;

• P160 million more for each of 297 congressmen; and

• P23 billion for selected senators.

Lacson is pleading with Duterte to veto the pork barrels on signing the budget law. That would be ultimate proof of the administration’s anti-corruption stance.

When the SC illegalized the pork barrel, it was only P200 million for each of 24 senators and P70 million for each of 255 congressmen – or a total of P22.65 billion a year. Today five years later lawmakers continue to illegally partake of pork – 17.5 times more.

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“Hotdog Music Minus 1 – A Tribute Concert for Rene Garcia, co-founder/composer of the Pinoy band Hotdog – hailed and acclaimed as the group that started and nurtured Original Pilipino Music.

This very special concert is a celebration of the life and music of Rene Garcia (who passed away six months ago), and a second look at the impact of Hotdog music on the lives of millions of Filipinos.

Hotdog’s music is timeless, and have become the soundtrack of many lives: “Manila”, “Pers Lab”, “Bongga Ka ‘Day”, “Ikaw ang Miss Universe ng Buhay Ko”, “Annie Batungbakal”, “Panaginip”, “Behhh Buti Nga”, “O Lumapit Ka”, “Langit na Naman”, “Ikaw Pa Rin”, “Bandang Pinoy”, “Sabado Nights”, among others.

Noteworthy: 90% of the original female singers of Hotdog will be at the concert to showcase their exceptional singing abilities. The best part: the concert is for a good cause, with part of the proceeds going to Bandang Pinoy Cooperative to help old musicians with pressing health and financial issues.

This historic concert is happening on Mar. 27 at the SMX Convention Center, SM Aura (BGC).

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Catch Sapol radio show, Saturdays, 8-10 a.m., DWIZ (882-AM).

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