Budget Secretary Florencio Abad. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—A two-year-old Department of Budget and Management memorandum shows President Aquino exercising discretion over P31.962 billion in what his critics have described as presidential pork barrel.
The seven-page document dated June 27, 2012 showed the President approving Budget Secretary Florencio Abad’s request that the DBM be granted “omnibus authority to consolidate” and “realign” government savings that year.
Mr. Aquino also allowed Abad to withdraw unobligated balances” of national government agencies “for slow-moving projects” in 2012 so they could also be realigned.
“These measures will allow us to maximize the use of available allotments to fund and undertake other priority expenditures of the national government,” Abad wrote.
“Furthermore, these will allow us to meet our fiscal targets without necessarily impacting on our budget deficit cap this year.”
But the President placed a note saying that the P31.962 billion in additional projects Abad had listed was still “subject to further discussions.”
Topping the list were “national road projects” in Tarlac, the President’s province, worth P2 billion. To “complete the rehabilitation and paving of all arterial secondary national roads and bridges” in the province, the government would have to spend more than the original estimate of P1.1 billion, the document stated.
Sought for comment, Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares described the President’s note as “damning because it shows that he had sole discretion over where the money should go.”
“It falls under the definition of pork barrel where discretion on how public funds would be spent rests on one person and that’s the President in this case,” he told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in a phone interview.
That the President called for “further discussions” on the additional projects “makes him the holder of P31.962 billion worth of pork barrel.”
Abad’s memorandum came eight months after the President had authorized the DBM to “pool savings to fund the Disbursement Acceleration Plan [DAP].”
“It is understood that in the utilization of the pooled savings, the DBM secures the approval/confirmation of the President,” Abad wrote.
“Furthermore, it is assured that the proposed realignments shall be within the authorized expenditure level.”
Colmenares said the Abad memo represented the President’s “written instruction” for the DBM to go ahead with the DAP, which the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional last Tuesday.
Included in Abad’s list of additional projects to be funded by DAP money were “other priority local projects nationwide” to the tune of P8.295 billion.
Also listed was P1.4 billion for the rehabilitation and extension of Light Rail Transit Lines 1 and 2, and P1.96 billion for the construction and rehabilitation of rural health units.
A total of P1.337 billion was also set aside supposedly to create jobs for 93,587 youth.
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