Powerful President seen after SC ruling
Far from being a lame duck, President Aquino will become more powerful unless the Supreme Court clips his pork barrel funds, opposition lawmakers say.
According to them, the high court’s ruling on Tuesday declaring congressional pork barrel systems illegal has in fact tilted the balance of power among the branches of government in favor of the executive as lawmakers will now have to make a beeline to Malacañang to ensure that their pet projects are included in the national budget.
The minority bloc in the House of Representatives said patronage politics would persist unless the Supreme Court declares the President’s Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) and other lump sum discretionary funds under his disposal unconstitutional, just like the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).
Partial victory
Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Javier Colmenares said the court decision, by a 14-0 vote, was a “partial victory of the Filipino people and the Abolish Pork Movement.”
“There’s still the issue of presidential pork. So long as it exists, the same patronage will exist. The presidential pork is P932 billion and all members of Congress will go to the President and ask P70 million for congressmen and P200 million for senators, and the PDAF is resurrected,” Colmenares said in a briefing.
“The battle isn’t over. There is presidential pork in the form of lump sums, DAP, off-budget accounts. The battle against pork barrel must be completed with the abolition of the presidential pork,” he added.
In a news briefing on Wednesday, presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda rejected the idea that without the pork barrel, Aquino would lose his influence over legislators and might even be reduced to being a “lame duck” President.
Non sequitur
“It’s non sequitur,” Lacierda said. “That kind of reasoning is not a one-is-to-one correspondence.”
He added: “We believe Congress has the interest of the Filipinos in mind, and the priorities of this government will be supported by the House and Senate because our concern is the concern of all Filipinos.”
On whether the Supreme Court’s decision against congressional pork barrel would eventually eliminate political patronage, Lacierda said: “Supreme Court decisions take time for [them] to become inculturated into the political atmosphere.”
If the Supreme Court does not address the lump sum funds in its anticipated ruling on the DAP, Colmenares said his group and other petitioners should push for a “people’s initiative focused on eliminating what the SC hasn’t touched.”
He was referring to a constitutional procedure that allows the people to override legislative inaction on a crucial political question.
“We have long been saying that lump sum amounts have no place in a real budget. We maintain that position,” Colmenares said, pointing out that Bayan was among the petitioners against PDAF.
DAP is pork
Minority Leader Ronaldo Zamora said: “We hope at some point, the SC will not just take a glance but in fact address squarely other lump sums, including presidential pork. We hope the SC, keeping in mind the DAP is presidential pork, will define what is legal and what is illegal under its forthcoming decision.”
The court on Tuesday began oral arguments on nine petitions questioning the constitutionality of the DAP—a little-known mechanism that impounded government savings into a kitty that, according to its critics, was distributed illegally to other departments.
Navotas City Rep. Tobias Tiangco cited for example the 2014 budget in which representatives were allowed to name their pet infrastructure projects of up to P24.8 million each, or 35 percent of a lawmaker’s P70 million annual pork barrel allocation which was supposedly sliced off the budget.
He said the remaining 65 percent formed a massive lump sum allocation solely under the discretion of the President.
“Members should heed the SC ruling to do away with patronage politics in the budget process. But the executive and its allied legislators can find a way to skirt the system if they want to. So if they carry on with the same frame of mind before, nothing will change,” Tiangco said in a press conference.
He concurred with the criticism that while the Supreme Court had ruled against Congress’ taking part on how the budget was spent, it would not stop Malacañang from talking to select lawmakers in formulating the proposed budget before submitting it formally to Congress.
Palace moving on
In his news briefing, Lacierda said Malacañang still had not seen a copy of the Supreme Court decision and that the next course of action would depend on the Solicitor General.
“We have to move forward,” he replied when asked by the Inquirer if the Palace would at least “welcome” the high court’s decision.
Under intense public pressure, President Aquino announced in August that it was time to abolish the PDAF. But he later defended the system of allowing lawmakers to identify projects funded by the pork barrel.
Justifying what amounted to a “pork” component in the DAP, he earlier argued that politicians were generally remembered on Election Day by “those that you have managed to help find work, those that you have educated, those that you have helped gain medical attention.”
“You’re a politician. You’d want to be reelected. Your work, therefore, has to devolve to constituency work,” he had said.
Taking Aquino’s cue, his allies in the House later deleted the PDAF in the 2014 budget, but realigned P25.4 billion to six agencies. A portion of this amount (P9.954 billion) was to be spent by the Department of Public Works and Highways for projects to be identified by lawmakers.
Where’s the beef?
Catholic prelates welcomed the decision of the court decision, but warned against its possible reincarnation under a different name.
“The pork is gone, but where is the beef?” Archbishop Emeritus Oscar Cruz said, explaining that politicians, who spend so much to be elected, would try to get back what they had spent.
“The Filipinos should not think that the battle is over because the public officials concerned will not just surrender and do nothing. We must watch them and watch them well,” Cruz said.
“What will Malacañang and the legislature do next? What conspiracy will they forge in order to recover their losses? What inventions will the two branches of government do to make money?” he added.
“I think it’s very positive, very good,” Msgr. Joselito Asis, Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines secretary general, said of the court decision. But, he asked, “Will they just replace it with another name?”
According to Lipa Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, “The PDAF by whatever name will be unconstitutional and an obvious disservice to our people. We should always fight such evil.”—With a report from Tina G. Santos
