Senators fail to agree on ‘pork’ abolition

Senate President Franklin Drilon PRIB FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines— Senators failed to reach a consensus on the proposed abolition of the “pork barrel” funds in 2014 during a caucus held at the Senate on Wednesday.

Instead, Senate President Franklin Drilon said they agreed to give each senator until November 11 to submit their written proposals on what to do with their respective P200 million Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) or “pork barrel” funds contained in the proposed national budget next year.

Drilon said the written proposals will be submitted to the Senate committee on finance being headed by Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero, which will consolidate and reflect all proposals in a report that will be presented in their next caucus on November 18.

“While there was no vote, my assessment is that a majority of the senators would just want it scrapped. But out of respect to the others, who were not around we just deferred final decision,” the Senate leader said after the caucus.

“From a personal assessment, there appears to be no resistant to scrapping the PDAF but as I said, that’s an assessment,” he said.

During the caucus, Drilon said there were discussions to just realign the PDAF to calamity fund like what the senators did with their remaining pork barrel funds this year.

But unlike the House of Representatives, the Senate might not allow the realignment of PDAF to other departments.

“If we go by way of abolition, there will be no realignments…the National Expenditure Program will be reduced to that extent,” Drilon said.

Only one thing was certain, he said: “Wala ng discretionary power, that one is a certainty. Wala ng discretionary power.”

Senate Majority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano, in a separate interview, said almost all senators were in favour of scrapping the “pork” and the only discussion was what to do with the total P4.8 billion PDAF contained in the budget.

“The question really is how to get the budget passed na porkless considering na dalawang houses of Congress and pinag-uusapan at hindi lang yung Senado (considering two houses of Congress and not just the Senate),”’ Cayetano said.

“Nagkakasundo na bawal na ang pork barrel. At bawal makialam ang senador. Whether tatanggalin or ibabawas sa total ng budget or whether ilalagay sa ibang kailangang gastusin, yun ang hindi pa napapagkasunduan (Everyone agrees that pork barrel is illegal. And a senator shouldn’t meddle. Whether it’s going to be scrapped or deducted from the total budget or allot in other necessary expenses, there goes the disagreement),” he added.

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