Aquino’s cash transfer program constitutional – SC

The Supreme Court building in Manila. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—The Supreme Court affirmed the constitutionality of allocating P21 billion from the 2011 national budget to be distributed as “life-saver” for impoverished families.

In a 12-page decision dated July 17 but released to the media Monday, the high court en banc through Associate Justice Estela Perlas-Bernabe said that while the Constitution and the Local Government Code encourages the local government units to be “self-reliant,” it does not mean that it can function as a “mini-state.”

“The allocation of a P21-billion budget for an intervention program formulated by the national government itself but implemented in partnership with the local government units to achieve the common national goal development and social progress can by no means be an encroachment upon the autonomy of local governments,” said the high court.

“While it is through a system of decentralization that the State shall promote a more responsive and accountable local government structure, the concept of local autonomy does not imply the conversion of local government units into mini-states,” the high court said.

Former Senator Aquilino Pimentel Jr. and along with Sergio Tadeo, Association of Barangay Captains (ABC) president of Cabanatuan City, and Nelson Alcantara, barangay captain of Barangay Santa Monica, Quezon City filed a petition with the high court saying the Executive Department committed grave abuse of discretion when it allocated the P21 billion for the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program taken from the 2011 national budget.

In 2011, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) got its biggest budget of P32.2 billion because of the CCT – a direct cash subsidy to poor families aimed at poverty reduction, achieving universal primary education, reduction of child mortality, improvement of maternal health, and promotion of gender equality and women empowerment.

The program, also known as the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), provides conditional cash grants to poor households particularly those with pregnant women and children ages 0-14.

In their petition, Pimentel, et al., said the CCT program is tantamount to “recentralization of the already devolved functions” under Republic Act 7160 or the Local Government Code of 1991 and thus violates the provision of the Constitution that mandates the state to ensure the autonomy of local governments.

But the high court, in its ruling said there is only decentralization of administration if the “central government delegates administrative powers to political subdivisions in order to broaden the base of government power and in the process to make local governments more responsive and accountable and ensure their fullest developments as self-reliant communities.”

The high court pointed that programs and policies effected locally “must be integrated and coordinated towards a common national goal. Thus, policy-setting for the entire country still lies in the President and Congress.”