House to slash supplemental budget by P23B

PHOTO by Ryan Leagogo / INQUIRER.net

The House of Representatives plans to trim down the P23.3-billion supplemental budget being sought by Malacañang to partially pay contractors of projects bankrolled by the outlawed Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) and Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).

House Majority Leader Neptali Gonzales II on Thursday said Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. and Davao Rep. Isidro Ungab, chair of the appropriations committee, and Secretaries Florencio Abad and Rogelio Singson met on Monday for a briefing, and they agreed to remove some items the government could forgo.

“We want these items removed before we file the supplemental budget,” Gonzales said in a news conference.

Gonzales said the filing of the supplemental budget was in compliance with the Supreme Court order banning the PDAF and the DAP.

He said around P1.8 billion of the supplemental budget was meant for public works projects that were completed but were not paid because the notices of cash allocations were released only after the Supreme Court decision.

He said among the items the Department of Budget and Management wanted additional funding for were Supertyphoon “Yolanda” (international name: Haiyan) rehabilitation projects and the preparations for the country’s hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) Leaders’ Summit next year.

Gonzales said the House would ensure that only projects that have allocations in this year’s budget would be covered by the supplemental budget.

He said new allocations would be excised from the list because the projects should have been placed in next year’s budget.

Gonzales said Congress had to approve the supplemental budget before the end of the year because the funds for the projects would be good only until Dec. 31.

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