MANILA, Philippines—Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman has resigned as chair of the influential House committee on appropriations just days before Malacañang is to submit to Congress its national expenditure program for next year.

In a letter dated Aug. 22, 2008, Lagman told Speaker Prospero Nograles he was quitting as head of the House budget panel in order “to afford me more time to pursue my advocacy for the enactment of a progressive and comprehensive reproductive health law.”

Lagman also said he wanted to honor the term-sharing agreement brokered by former Speaker Jose de Venecia between himself and Quirino Rep. Junie Cua, the senior vice chair of the appropriations committee.

“I plan to go both inside and outside Congress. I might even go out of town to campaign,” Lagman said in a telephone interview. “I'm going to one-on-one with my colleagues to convince them (about the merits of the reproductive health bill),” he added.

Lagman’s reproductive health and population development bill which seeks to institute a comprehensive family-planning policy is facing stiff opposition from the Catholic Church.

Lagman’s turn in the House budget panel will end on Aug. 26, on the eve of Malacañang's expected submission of the national expenditure program for 2008 to the House.

Lagman said he was trading places with Cua in the committee.

As chair of the budget panel, Lagman successfully initiated the “milestone allocation” of P2 billion for reproductive health and family planning in the 2008 national budget or General Appropriations Act.

President Macapagal-Arroyo approved the allocation along with the rest of the budget. Lagman said the P2-billion fund could serve “as the initial funding for the eventual passage of an RH law.” Norman Bordadora