Lacson: No 2019 budget unless Senate, House agree on ‘pizza pie’

MANILA, Philippines—The passage of the 2019 budget is dim before the adjournment of Congress this week unless legislators agree on their shares of the “pizza pie.”

“‘Pag hindi nagkasundo sa hatian ng pizza pie, malabo,” Senator Panfilo Lacson said in a text message on Monday.

It was Lacson who started to question the alleged “pork” insertions in the budget, which remained pending in the bicameral conference committee.

“Aside from the new issue raised by no less than the head of the House panel, the most contentious is how to deal with the P75 billion ‘adjustment’ inserted by DBM Sec. Diokno in the budget of DPWH,” the senator said.

READ: Reenacted budget looms over pork

Diokno is Department of Budget and Management Secretary Benjamin Diokno while DPWH is Department of Public Works and Highways.

DPWH Secretary Mark Villar earlier admitted that he was not aware of the P75 billion added to the agency’s budget next year until he saw the NEP.

“Why? It is basically one and the same piece of pie from which both houses used as fiscal space to carve out their realignments, like the P51.792 billion distributed to all the House members at an additional P60 million each on top of the P100 million already embedded in the NEP; and the 31.792B given to a select few, aside from other realignments to other agencies,” Lacson said.

NEP is Malacañang’s budget proposal submitted to Congress annually.

“The Senate, on the other hand, got from the same P75 billion individual and institutional amendments like the P23 billion and DOH (Department of Health) and others,” he pointed out.

The senator earlier claimed that some senators also have P23 billion insertions on the DPWH budget alone.

READ: Lacson slams pork insertions by senators

“In my case, I derived most of my institutional amendments from sources other than the P75 billion,” Lacson added. /je