Senate kicks off 2-week marathon floor debates
BY RAYMOND AFRICA and WENDELL VIGILIA
CONGRESS resumes its regular sessions today after a month-long Halloween break, with senators set to start plenary deliberations on the Marcos administration’s proposed P5.268 trillion national budget for 2023.
Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri said he expects the Senate to approve the 2023 General Appropriations Bill by the third week of November.
On the other hand, Speaker Martin Romualdez vowed to prioritize the final approval of the budget measure and have it ratified before the end of the year.
Zubiri said senators will hold a two-week marathon plenary deliberation on the proposed measure after Sen. Juan Edgardo Angara, chairperson of the Finance Committee, sponsors his panel’s report upon opening of the session this afternoon.
Zubiri reiterated the Senate is on schedule with the budget bill.
“We will go straight to the budget deliberations in the plenary… With the hard work and commitment of all our fellow senators, we expect to have two weeks of marathon plenary deliberations, and hopefully we can have it approved on third reading in the Senate as early as the third week of November,” Zubiri said.
Once the Senate approves the budget measure, Zubiri said the chamber will name its representatives to the bicameral congressional committee that will reconcile disagreeing provisions of the respective House and Senate versions of the bill.
Zubiri said that to meet their yearend target, the latest time for the bicameral panel to come up with a reconciled version of the measure will be by the second week of December.
Romualdez, for his part, said: “Of course, on top of our priority list is the final approval or ratification of the proposed P5.268-trillion national budget. We will have a budget before the end of the year.”
“One of our main priorities is the ratification of next year’s national budget to provide social safety nets for the people and help them recover from the economic displacement caused by COVID-19 (coronavirus disease). We will work harder for our economy to recover with agriculture as the major engine for growth and employment,” Romualdez said.
SENATE DISCUSSIONS
Zubiri said the different Senate finance sub-committees “carefully combed over our agencies programs and spendings” even while Congress was on break “to ensure that the 4.9 percent increase from this year’s budget is warranted and is crucial to the country’s continued recovery from the pandemic.”
Senate minority leader Aquilino Pimentel III said there are more than P480 billion worth of programs, activities, and projects from various agencies which have no details that can be re-allocated for the government’s disaster and calamity response programs.
He said the programs with no details are considered “lumpsum” appropriations, and these include the P9.5 billion confidential and intelligence funds (CIFs) being asked by the Office of the President, Office of the Vice President, PNP, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, and the Department of Education, among others.
The Office of the President is asking for P4.5 billion in CIF, while the OVP wants P500 million, while the DepEd is seeking for the approval of P150 million in CIF.
Aside from the OVP and DepEd, he said a review of the proposed national budget showed that there the Energy Regulatory Commission, the Department of Agriculture, and the office of the Department of the Interior and Local Government secretary are likewise requesting for CIFs.
“Kulang sa detalye. Nakasulat lang confidential and intelligence funds. Nili-liquidate lang ‘yan eh. Isusulat na ginastos, tapos ilalagay sa envelope, tapos isi-seal. ‘Yun na ‘yun. So, parang puedeng masayang, puedeng mawaldas kasi ganoon lang ang pag liquidate
(They lack details. What is written is ‘confidential and intelligence funds.’ It is easy to liquidate it. You just have to write that it was already spent, put it in an envelope, seal it, that’s it. So, that can easily go to waste, that can be abused because it is very easy to liquidate it),” Pimentel told radio dzBB.
He said it will set a bad precedent if Congress approves the CIFs without question as this could encourage other civilian agencies to likewise request for the same in the future.
“Ang point namin huwag na natin umpisahan with these civilian agencies kasi kapag nakita ‘yan ng ibang department sasabihin nila ‘kami rin’, di ba? Ano na mangyayari? Lahat nakalinya na sa intelligence funds, yan ang problema kapag inumpisahan na natin. If we grant it to the secretary of the DepEd, ang reason magbabantay sa lahat ng schools, eh ‘di ba law enforcement na ‘yan, dinodoble natin lahat (Our point is, let us not start with these civilian agencies because other departments may also want to have CIFs. So, what will happen? All agencies will line up for their intelligence funds. That will be the problem if we start to grant them CIFs. If we give it to the secretary of DepEd, the reason of which is to monitor all schools, but that is already a law enforcement function and we are just duplicating it),” he added.
Pimentel said the other allocations which lack details are the P10 billion requested by the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), P13 billion in gross equity of an agency which he did not disclose, P140 billion for the unprogrammed Support to Infrastructure and Social Program (SIPSIP) of the Department of Budget and Management, and P300 billion to support foreign assisted projects.
He vowed to also question the more than P500 billion lumpsum appropriations under the proposed budget of the Department of Public Works and Highways.
He said Congress needs to know the details of these programs, activities, and projects so they can determine if they are worthwhile programs, and for accounting purposes.
“Kung walang detalye parang binigyan mo ng authority ang Presidente na siya na ang mag-desisiyon kung saan pupunta ang pondo. So, parang sinurender ng Kongreso ang power of the purse, dapat nga ang concerned sa detalye ay kongreso mismo (If there are no details, it is as if you have given the President the authority to decide where the funds will be spent. So, it is like surrendering to the President the power of the purse which is the role of Congress. And it is Congress which should be concerned on the details of these projects, activities, and programs),” he said.
“You can be generous with the amount, policy na ‘yun ok ‘yun, decision na ng Kongreso ‘yun. Pero pagdating sa constitutional requirements, may details na dapat. Wala kaming choice doon, trabaho namin ‘yun (You can be generous with the amount, that is a policy and that is okay. But when it comes to constitutional requirement, there should be details. We have no choice because that is our job),” he added.
Sen. Francis Tolentino said the proposed national budget for 2023 must be adjusted into an annual government allocation program that is both flexible and receptive to future natural and man-made disasters.
Romualdez said the House will also work to approve on final reading before Congress goes on a Christmas break on December 17 the measures that were identified by the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory (LEDAC) last October 10.
The 16 to 18 bills cover efficient public service, job creation, health, and economic recovery to protect the country’s most vulnerable sector from the endemic stage of COVID-19 and global inflation.
“We will also speed up the passage of LEDAC-priority bills, including the E-Governance Act and E-Government Act, in response to the appeal of President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr.,” Romualdez said.
Romualdez said Congress will support the President’s initiative to provide subsidies to the most vulnerable sectors to cushion the impact of global inflation after the Chief Executive ensured continued support for them in the form of cash transfers and fuel discounts.
Apart from the E-Governance and E-Government Act bills, the House leader said the rest of the other priority bills are the following: Medical Reserve Corps, the proposed Virology Institute of the Philippines, proposed National Disease Prevention Management program, revival of the mandatory Reserve Officers’ Training Corps and National Service Training Program, amendments to the Build-Operate-Transfer law, condonation of unpaid amortization and interests of loans of agrarian reform beneficiaries, valuation reform, proposed Passive Income and Financial Intermediary Taxation Act (PIFITA), proposed Internet Transaction Act, proposed Government Financial Institutions Unified Initiatives to Distressed Enterprises for Economic Recovery (GUIDE), proposed Department of Water Resources, proposed new Philippine Passport Act, proposed waste-to-energy Bill, proposed Magna Carta for Barangay Health Workers, and proposed National Government Rightsizing program.
The Speaker added that the House of Representatives will likewise try to pass on third and final reading the proposed Magna Carta of Filipino Seafarers and the Budget Modernization bills.
During the first LEDAC meeting, the 20-member council initially listed 32 priority measures, some of which have already been passed by Congress and signed into law by President Marcos, particularly Republic Act (RA) No. 11934 or the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) Registration Act and RA No. 11935 or the postponement of the 2022 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE) from December 5, 2022, to October 30, 2023.
The other LEDAC-approved measures are the Unified System of Separation, Retirement and Pension bill, National Land Use Act, National Defense Act, enactment of an enabling law for the natural gas industry, amendments to the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA), establishment of regional specialty hospitals, Magna Carta of Filipino Seafarers, establishing the Negros Island Region, the proposed Apprenticeship Act, providing free legal assistance for military and uniformed personnel, the creation of the Leyte Ecological Industrial Zone, and the Creation of the Eastern Visayas Development Authority.
