MANILA, Philippines—Opposition Sen. Panfilo Lacson on Friday said the proceedings of the bicameral conference on the proposed P1.4-trillion national budget for 2009 should be opened to the public “so everyone will know where these appropriations will go.”

He said the bicameral conference committee, which reconciles the House and Senate versions of the budget, should convene as soon as possible to avoid the government’s having to function on a rolled-over budget for the whole of 2009.

“Lest we operate again on a reenacted budget, we must take steps to ensure the early signing of the national budget into law. Not only that, the entire process must be transparent so the public will know where their taxes go,” he said in a statement.

Since the start of the new year, the government has been operating on the P1.227-trillion 2008 budget, which was automatically rolled over because of the failure of Congress to enact the 2009 budget before adjourning for the holiday break last December.

Congressional leaders vowed to reconcile the separate budget bills when Congress resumes sessions on Jan. 19. After approval by the bicam, the final copy of the bill will go to the Senate and House for ratification before being sent to President Macapagal-Arroyo for signing into law.

According to Lacson, during the bicam’s very first meeting last month, the committee adopted his motion to make the proceedings public.

Bare all insertions

He said the bicam meetings should be “transparent and thorough, with all details of ‘insertions’ open to media and the public.”

“This motion should be strictly followed. Who made the insertions, how much was involved, what are the purposes of these insertions and where will they be sourced from? All these should be made public in the name of transparency to avoid a repetition of the P200-million ‘road to nowhere’ mess,” the senator said.

The House has realigned P14 billion from the debt service allocation as a lump sum fund, but did not specifically say where these funds would go.

To the P14-billion cut from the debt service, the Senate slashed another P10 billion, for a total of P24 billion. This was supposedly done to provide the government and the economy with a “stimulus fund” to weather the global financial crisis this year.

To prevent Malacañang from realigning the reenacted 2008 budget to its “pet projects” this year, Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile has proposed a special provision for the retroactive effectivity of the 2009 budget to Jan. 1, once the bill is signed into law.

“This will render moot and academic whatever realignments they made during this period when the 2009 budget is not yet enacted. Malacañang will then adjust the budgetary disbursements accordingly,” Enrile said.

Lacson urged legislators to fulfill their responsibility to participate actively and ensure transparency in the bicameral conference committee meetings.

He said the people would not tolerate a repeat of the “double entry” anomalies that were found in the national budget for 2008, where multimillion-peso entries were allotted more than once to particular items or projects.

Lacson unearthed the alleged double insertion of P200 million in the 2008 budget for the C5 road extension project which he said benefited the property development business of then Senate President Manuel Villar. The controversy led to the Senate coup last November that ousted Villar and installed Enrile as Senate President.

Lacson also cited for particular scrutiny the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), also known as the pork barrel, a lump sum fund which has become a source of kickbacks for lawmakers.

The proposed 2009 budget has retained the P200-million PDAF allocation for each senator and P70 million for each of the 238 House members.

Lacson said the President’s office also has its share of pork barrel, which “can’t be quantified,” most of it tucked in budgetary allocations of line agencies.

He said special purpose funds can be “classified as pork for the President,” like the one listed under the Agricultural Fisheries Modernization Act, with a funding of P37 billion.

He said all departments have special purpose funds and they are all at the disposal of the President.

“It’s big. It can’t be disbursed [by the department secretaries] without clearance from the President, such as the P728-million fertilizer fund,” he said.

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. pressed for changing the legislative schedule on the annual national budget by requiring Malacañang to submit its budget proposal to Congress in January, instead of July or August.

Pimentel said the early transmittal of the general appropriations bill to Congress would do away with the perennial problem of delayed approval, resulting in the automatic roll-over of the previous year’s budget.

“The problem is when the old budget is reenacted, the funds intended for projects are virtually converted into discretionary funds of the President, at least during the first quarter of the year,” he said.

Although there is nothing intrinsically wrong with the automatic reenactment of the old budget, “this gives the President too much leeway in spending public money to the extent that it becomes her pork barrel that it is used for dispensing political favors,” said Pimentel.