DURING the process of enactment of the General Appropriations Act of 2021, there was no budgetary item more controversial than that of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), an office created by President Duterte in 2018 specifically to help the military and security forces defeat the decades-old communist insurgency.
Congress gave the NTF-ELCAC a budget of P19.13 billion, a big chunk of which — P16.44 billion — was allotted for its flagship project, the Barangay Development Program (BDP).
This program seeks to deliver social and infrastructure development packages in 822 barangays that were cleared of communist influence from 2016 to 2019. The remaining P2.69 billion was intended for the operational expenses of the task force.
‘Secretary Esperon believes that
so long as the ELCAC funds are used judiciously for constructing farm-to-market roads, school buildings… as well as bringing various job training in conflict areas or former guerrilla bases, there is no justification for tweaking its use.’
Critics of this allocation, especially those from the Leftist camp in the House of Representatives, fought tooth and nail against the item, but the majority of legislators in the two chambers prevailed. When the government lacked money to fund the Bayanihan laws that would distribute subsidy to thousands of poor families affected by the enhanced community quarantine in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the same group of lawmaker-critics, opposition and even administration-friendly senators again pointed their fingers at the ELCAC.
The barrel-scraping for the “ayuda” funds has been solved, but it looks like Vice President Leni Robredo is still at it, proposing a budget realignment, prompting National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr. to call her out.
Esperon wondered why the Vice President and other critics are singling out the NTF-ELCAC budget as source of “ayuda” funds, and did not mince words in stating that the VP and her cabal are “making it appear that the NTF-ELCAC is so insensitive and irrelevant in addressing the effects of the pandemic especially to those who are in need of Social Amelioration Program or ayuda.”
The National Security Adviser slammed these critics, saying that they are currying favors with voters as the national elections near, the reason they are using the need for SAP to justify using the ELCAC budget for projects for which it was not intended.
Secretary Esperon believes that so long as the ELCAC funds are used judiciously for constructing farm-to-market roads, school buildings, health stations, water and electric facilities as well as bringing various job training in conflict areas or former guerrilla bases, there is no justification for tweaking its use.
Either you agree with him or you don’t but the important thing is for the Duterte administration to solve both the humongous problems of insurgency and social amelioration.
