Youth solon aims to amend 2016 nat’l budget to give SUCs more funds

Kabataan Party List Rep. Terry Ridon. INQUIRER file photo

A militant youth solon wants to amend the proposed 2016 national budget which was approved on third reading last Friday to give more funds to state universities and colleges (SUCs).

READ: House OKs P3-trillion nat’l budget for 2016

In a press conference Wednesday, Kabataan Rep. Terry Ridon said he filed a set of amendments to House Bill 6132 or the 2016 General Appropriations Bill to “excise provisions that transform several agency budgets into pork.”

Accompanied by student leaders from the National Union of Students of the Philippines, League of Filipino Students, and the College Editors Guild of the Philippines, Ridon said these lump sum funds under different agencies should instead be channeled to the budget of different SUCs.

READ: Budget cut in state schools hit

In his letter to appropriations panel chairman Davao City Rep. Isidro Ungab, Ridon asked to restore P477.8 million removed from the maintenance and other operating expenses of 59 SUCs.

Ridon said this could be sourced from the P3.4 billion budget for the compensation and separation benefits of the Citizen Armed Forces Geographical Units.

He also asked for P4.1 billion capital outlay for 27 SUCs, including the premier state university University of the Philippines, to be sourced from the item “Budgetary Support to Government Corporations – Others.”

Ridon likewise proposed amendments to the special provision on Bottom-up Budgeting (BUB) Program to strengthen congressional oversight.

He said the BUB is being used as a political patronage tool to shower allies with projects, saying the project is centralized to the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), formerly headed by the Liberal Party (LP) standard-bearer Manuel “Mar” Roxas II.

Ridon said several mayors and governors in the Cordillera region transferred to the ruling LP after being granted projects funded under the BUB.

“Because it is centralized to the DILG, the release is really dependent on your closeness to power,” Ridon said.

The Makabayan bloc voted against passage of the proposed P3.002 trillion national budget, saying it is a huge pork barrel fund to be used in the 2016 elections.

Under the BUB, municipal local government units would coordinate with the national government and civil society organizations to identify anti-poverty priority projects for funding. RAM