Recto questions Comelec’s P16.8-billion proposed 2015 budget

Senate Pro Tempore Ralph Recto. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

MANILA, Philippines–The Commission on Elections’ (Comelec) proposed budget for 2015 will soar to P16.8 billion, or six times its budget this year, an increase that Senate Pro Tempore Ralph Recto wants the agency to explain.

Recto on Wednesday said P3.76 billion of the Comelec budget will be used to buy 41,800 precinct count optical scan or PCOS machines at a cost of P90,000 each.

The new PCOS machines, he said, will augment the 80,000 units in the poll body’s inventory.

“In all, the Comelec is eyeing to buy P11.4- billion worth of assorted new equipment,” the senator said in a statement, quoting a briefing paper by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) on the highlights of the proposed P2.6-trillion 2015 national budget.

On top of the P11.43 billion for capital outlays, Recto said another 2016 election-related expense frontloaded in the 2015 budget is P1.2 billion for “preparatory activities” including voters’ registration.

He said the Comelec is targeting a four-percent increase in the number of registered voters which stood at 54,051,626 in August last year.

But pending the submission of the details of the mulled PCOS purchase, the senator said he would withhold judgment on whether its multi-billion price tag was justified.

“There are good and competent men in the Comelec like Chairman Brillantes. We have to get their side and also the views of other stakeholders who are likewise well-meaning,” he said.

“But what I am interested in knowing is if this will be a recurring expense, if this is what we will have to shell out every time we hold an election, which in this land is once every 500 days,” Recto said.

The senator noted that aside from national elections, elections are also called for Sangguniang Barangay (SB) and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) posts every three years.

On the last two alone, he said, 672,442 officials are elected, a chairman for every SB and SK in 42,028 barangays and seven council members for each SB and SK.

In addition, about 18,050 national and local posts are elected.

“We have a ‘job fair’ every three years to allow people to hire close to 700,000 officials and the manner of hiring them is the one that’s expensive,” Recto said.

“We can only hire less than a thousand doctors, probably a hundred PhD scientists and about 10,000 policemen every three years but we recruit elected officials in bulk, by the hundreds of thousands during the same period,” he said.

If the P16-billion cost to hold an election becomes a regular request every three years, then Recto said, “There is no harm in looking for other means on how to bring down the cost of administering elections in this country.

He said the final 2016 election tab could also be higher since the P16.8 billion was just the request of the Comelec for preparations to be done a year before.

“That amount does not include the funds required for election year proper,” said the senator.

“Kung ganun kalaki ang gastos, maraming magtatanong kung bakit tayo bibili ng ganun kadaming PCOS machine na gagamitin lang once every three years gayong mas kailangan natin ng dialysis machines o X-ray machines,” he added.

(If the expenses are that big, many people would ask why we would buy that many PCOS machines that we would use once every three years when we have a bigger need for dialysis machines or X-ray machines.)

Recto also noted that the proposed P11.4 billion for new Comelec equipment is 19 times bigger than the proposed P592 million for NAIA expansion, 28 times of the budget for 398 new DOH doctors in 2015, two and half times the total senior citizens pension of some 739,000 elderly.

“It is three and a half times of what our national vaccines and immunization budget is for next year, 11 times bigger than the Community Mortgage Program budget, and 22 times bigger than the Quick Reaction Fund of the Department of Agriculture for calamities,” he said.

But Recto said he was not blaming the Comelec.

“Probably what is at fault here is that we have so many government units, which create many positions up for grabs, which invite many candidates, who in turn will be chosen by a large voting base,” he said.

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