Underspent, overspent
Criticism of President Benigno Aquino III’s “underspending” by some of his ardent opponents may prove useful to view in light of the deadline for drafting next year’s budget for local government units (LGUs) last Oct. 17.
Aquino’s critics claim that underspending this year and next year’s budget may deprive Filipinos of the basic social services that they’ve come to expect from the government like medicine, food, housing and farmland.
These same critics have also taken potshots at the Aquino administration for continuing and even expanding the “doleout” program started by their former boss and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
It’s a different story in Cebu City where Mayor Michael Rama came under fire from the dominant opposition City Council for planning an P11.8-billion budget without clearly identifying viable revenue sources.
The budget is a joke, said Vice Mayor Joy Augustus Young and his patron, former Cebu City mayor and now Rep. Tomas Osmeña of Cebu City’s south district.
If one were to examine the revenue sources cited by Rama, the budget may very well be a joke.
Among them are increased taxes, the sale of South Road Property (SRP) lots and a standby credit line of P2 billion from Cebu City’s depository banks. Rama echoed the line of his predecessor’s critics when he said there weren’t enough funds allocated for basic services by the previous administration.
With his P11.8-billion budget, Rama said, that inequity will be addressed. But the mayor has some problems. First off, the direct payment of taxes by current SRP occupants like SM to the Bureau of Internal Revenue showed that the city was unable to deliver the tax incentives it promised to future buyers of Cebu City’s prime reclamation project.
So how can the city, which is already losing millions of pesos in revenues for the SRP rentals, manage to sell the SRP to prospective buyers who may find the cost a bit too prohibitive for their tastes?
Rama already promised to update his constituents on the actual status of the SRP and we have yet to receive word of his report, and raising taxes has always been anathema to businessmen, who always consider the tax situation before setting up shop in any area.
Given this backdrop, can Rama actually make good on raising his ambitious budget? More importantly, will Cebu City residents have to endure more years of the city government’s “skin and bones” budget and not see money being spent to repair their roads and drainage systems?
This we could only monitor in the long, tedious budget hearings to be done by the council in the next few weeks. We could only hope they won’t scrimp on spending for social services just like in the previous years.
