Audit of Duterte’s P8.6-billion election year intel funds pressed

Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate. INQUIRER file photo

MANILA, Philippines — House Deputy Minority Leader and Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Isagani Zarate on Saturday called on the leadership of the House of Representatives to invoke Congress’ oversight functions and press for an audit of the government’s P8.6-billion confidential and intelligence (CIF) funds.

Zarate filed House Bill No. 626, which seeks to require the audit of government intelligence and confidential funds, which normally are beyond the reach of the Commission on Audit (COA).

“With around P8.6 billion in confidential and intelligence funds, which is the highest in Philippine budget history, and the [COA] admission of difficulty auditing the use of such funds, it becomes imperative now that Congress should exercise oversight powers over such gargantuan public funds,” Zarate said in his bill.

He filed the measure a day after the House committee on appropriations swiftly approved the P8.182-billion budget of the Office of the President (OP) for 2022.

Under this proposed funding, Malacañang sought a total of P4.5 billion in confidential and intelligence funds, or 55-percent of its total proposed allotment for 2022.

Under the 2022 National Expenditure Program (NEP), the OP is seeking the highest funding for CIF among all agencies, with the Department of National Defense coming in second with P1.75 billion.

The Department of the Interior and Local Government, which oversees the Philippine National Police, aims to get a CIF of P806 million.

“Other executive offices” seek to get a CIF of P140.2 million, while the Department of Transportation, which is in charge of the Philippine Coast Guard, is eyeing a CIF of P10 million, according to the 2022 NEP.

Invoking “tradition of parliamentary courtesy” with a co-equal branch of government, the House committee ended deliberations on the OP budget even before Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea could make his presentation.

The committee also snuffed out objections raised by Kabataan party-list Rep. Sarah Jane Elago about ending the discussions with the committee chair ACT-CIS Rep. Eric Yap assuring opposition lawmakers that they will be given ample chance to raise objections during the plenary deliberations.

In past budget deliberations, however, House leaders also made the same assurances, only to strike down objections during the plenary debates, saying all issues have already been threshed out and addressed during the committee hearings.

According to Zarate, the government should rectify the “highly anomalous” mode of allocation intelligence and confidential funds that are “free from audit, public scrutiny, and official accountability.”

“The CIF has become so large and its use remain hidden that abuse and misuse of the funds are ever-present, more so under a tyrannical regime, and also now that elections are coming,” he said.

The Bayan Muna representative said Congress needed to “assert its power over the purse and see if the funds it allocated were indeed used for its published purpose.”