Diokno not worried about nat’l budget ‘deadlock’ over CHR allocation

Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno. TOTO LOZANO/Presidential Photo

Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno on Thursday expressed doubt that the clashing views of the House of Representatives and the Senate on the Commission on Human Rights’ (CHR) budget would lead to a “deadlock” in the 2018 national budget.

On Wednesday, minority leader Senator Franklin Drilon warned of a possible deadlock in the deliberations of the proposed 2018 national budget if the House will not waiver its decision to slash CHR’s 2018 budget to P1,000.

“The Senate, I would like to think, will not stand for the abolition of the CHR, through giving it a P1,000 budget,” Drilon said. “If the House will insist on that, then there will be a deadlock for 2018 General Appropriations Act (GAA).”

READ: Drilon sees ‘deadlock’ in national budget over CHR allocation

Explaining the budget process, Diokno said he is not worried about Drilon’s statement.

“The budget process is like this: we submit the budget to the House, copy furnish the Senate. The House under the Constitution has the first crack on the budget. Now they have made some adjustments; some of those adjustments are not acceptable to the senators, some senators. So now they will pass their own version of the budget and if there are disagreeing provisions, they will form what is called a conference committee or what we call the third chamber,” he said in an ambush interview at the Arangkada Philippines forum in Pasay City.

“So at this time I’m not worried what’s going to happen. I’ll just look at what will come out of the third chamber,” the secretary added.

Diokno also urged the people to not speculate at this time.

When asked if he would recommend increasing the budget of the CHR, Diokno said the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) had already done its job.
“This is a political process, we have done our job we have submitted to them the budget so it’s up to them,” said Diokno. /je