If Palace can’t have it, constitutional bodies must explain how they spend it

MANILA, Philippines—Malacañang is not giving up completely with respect to nearly  P5-billion of what critics call part of its own “pork barrel” in the proposed national budget without a fight.

Budget Secretary Florencio Abad met with Sen. Franklin Drilon, chairman of the committee on finance, to come up with a compromise on the controversial “miscellaneous personnel benefits fund” or MPBF.

While agreeing to respect the “fiscal autonomy” of constitutional bodies, the two officials decided to require them to subject a quarterly report on how they spent their respective allocations for unfilled positions.

The amount in question totals P4.97 billion, representing the personnel services funds of the judiciary, Commission on Elections, Commission on Human Rights, Commission on Audit, Civil Service Commission, and the Office of the Ombudsman. Also included are allocations for career positions in both chambers of Congress.

“We will respect the fiscal autonomy of constitutional bodies, which means that (the fund) will be put under the budget of the constitutional bodies,” Drilon told the Inquirer. “But we will require reporting of the usage. We will ask for a regular quarterly reporting of the disbursement of these funds pertaining to unfilled positions.”

Asked if the quarterly report was not tantamount to putting a condition on the allocation, he said: “It’s not a condition. It’s a requirement for transparency.”

Sen. Joker Arroyo earlier expressed concern despite Drilon’s pronouncement that the Senate would respect the constitutional bodies’ fiscal autonomy, particularly on the use of their budget for unfilled positions.

Malacañang put up the MPBF in the proposed 2012 national budget to impound the unspent allocations for personnel services in all three branches of government. Arroyo said the entire MPBF amounted to P101 billion.

“Malacañang cannot put conditions on the budget of constitutional bodies because that’s their budget,” Arroyo told the Inquirer on Thursday. “It has no business controlling it.”

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile earlier described the MPBF as a form of “pork barrel” in the national budget.

Drilon said constitutional bodies still had “the power to realign their respective budgets in accordance with law.”

But should they fail to comply with reporting requirements, constitutional bodies would “have to answer to taxpayers,” according to the senator.

“That would be an issue that would have to be confronted in the next round of the budget next year,” he said.