Marcos to sign 2024 budget with P500-B aid for poor

President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr. answers questions from the media during the last day of the ASEAN-Japan Friendship and Cooperation Commemorative Summit in Tokyo, Japan on Monday, December 18, 2023. (Photo by YUMMIE DINGDING / PPA Pool)

MANILA, Philippines — House Speaker Martin Romualdez said that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. would sign on Wednesday the P5.768-trillion national budget for 2024, which includes P500 billion in assistance for 48 million poor Filipinos and over P2 billion for projects to assert the country’s sovereignty in the West Philippine Sea.

“We are hoping that in some way, we are able to support people who badly need government help to get them through hard times,” Romualdez said in a statement on Tuesday.

Congress also earmarked an additional P800 million for constructing a shelter port for fisherfolk and their boats in Lawak, Palawan—the island closest to Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal, which serves as a military outpost for Filipino troops.

This is apart from the P1.5 billion set aside earlier for the development and expansion of the Pag-asa Island Airport.

Romualdez said the additional funding for projects in the West Philippine Sea was a “manifestation of the Marcos administration’s determination to assert the country’s sovereignty.”

“We in Congress are one with the President in protecting the West Philippine Sea and in calling out China for its aggressive activities there, and its harassment of our Coast Guard, soldiers, fishermen, and civilian vessels,” he added.

Bicam report ratified

Last week, Congress ratified its bicameral conference committee report on conflicting provisions in the House and Senate versions of the 2024 General Appropriations bill. The final version was then forwarded to Malacañang for approval.

According to Romualdez, at least 9 percent of the national budget, or P500 billion, would go to several financial assistance programs under different government agencies.

One of these was the Ayuda sa Kapos ang Kita or Akap, with a budget of P60 billion, which would give direct cash assistance to “near poor families” earning up to P23,000 a month.

“At least 12 million households will benefit from it, including low-income workers like those in construction and factories, drivers, food service crew and the like. The target beneficiaries would receive a one-time cash assistance of P5,000. If the program is successful, we can continue implementing it next year,” he said.

The Assistance to Individuals in Crisis Situation under the Department of Social Welfare will get P223 billion while the Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Disadvantage/Displaced Workers under the Department of Labor and Employment will receive funding of P30 billion.

‘Wish list’

Sen. JV Ejercito, meanwhile, reiterated that unprogrammed appropriations in the 2024 national budget were not lump-sum allotments similar to pork barrel funds but a “wish list” of projects proposed by lawmakers.

He said that projects not included in the original budget proposals of government agencies would usually end up as unprogrammed budget items based on legislators’ request.

“These are itemized projects that are part of the ‘wish list’ recommended by the respective legislators,” Ejercito told reporters at the Kapihan sa Senado media forum on Tuesday.

“[In our case], we ask the [Senate] committee on finance to include these projects, hoping that there will be excess [funds] in the programmed funds,” he said. “What we can only do next is to keep our fingers crossed that these will be funded later on.”

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel III earlier claimed that the 2024 national budget was unconstitutional and may be challenged in the Supreme Court due to the P450-billion increase in unprogrammed appropriations.

Under the final version approved by the bicameral conference committee, Pimentel said the unprogrammed allotments ballooned to P731.4 billion, which brought to more than P6 trillion the national spending plan next year, the highest outlay approved by Congress.