Sen. Panfilo Lacson yesterday pressed the government to account for the P512 billion it has borrowed to fund its emergency response measures against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic amid complaints of irregularities in its distribution.
Lacson, vice chairman of the Senate finance committee, said he would seek an inventory of the disbursements when the Senate begins committee deliberations on the proposed 2022 national budget.
Lacson said senators have been getting information that a lot of the beneficiaries of the government’s Special Amelioration Program (SAP) have not yet received their share, and that the P5,000 special allowance for healthcare workers under the Bayanihan 1 have not been fully distributed to its intended recipients.
Lacson said the special allowance for healthcare workers was a measure that he and Sen. Grace Poe introduced in Bayanihan 1, which is on top of the healthcare workers’ hazard pay.
He said healthcare workers who have yet to get their P5,000 special allowance was “highlighted” after the government released P13.1 billion as financial assistance for low-income families affected by the August 6 to 20 enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) in Metro Manila.
Lacson noted that the government still has P82 billion under its disposal – P2.5 billion under the Department of Health’s regular budget, P70 billion in unprogrammed funds which will be borrowed from other revenue generating agencies, and P10 billion from the Bayanihan funds for the purchase of vaccines.
“We need to scrutinize this when the budget deliberations come. We have received a lot of reports that there are problems in SAP distribution, a lot of issues came out in the SAP distribution. A lot of beneficiaries have not received their share… The government needs to account for this considering that the benefits of some sectors, especially the healthcare workers, have not been addressed,” he added.
Lacson said it would not be far-fetched that the government’s debt could balloon to P13 trillion before the Duterte administration bows out in June 2022. The present governent debts already stand at more than P11 trillion, from just around P5.9 trillion during the Aquino administration. — With Gerard Naval
