6 THURSDAy JUL' 18,201e
Avoid the delay that
plagued this year's budget
THE dispute
the reason
over "pork barrel,, was
. -1. the 2019 national budget
bill was approved only in March,20i9,
when it should have been approved in
December, 2018. Because of the three_
month delay, the government had to
use a reenacted 2019 national budget,
just so normal government operations
could continue and government work_
could get paid.
-
..ers
But new projects could not be imple_
mented. These included many infra_
structures under "Build, Build; Build,,
- roads and bridges, airports and sea_
ports, school buildings and other gov_
ernment structures. As government
spercrng accounts for a big part of
rne. Gross_Domesti€ product (GDp), the
national GDp sank in those tirst three
months of 2019. We can only hope that
rne. Department of public Works and
Highw-ays (DPWH) can make up tn the
resr of the year for those three months
of inaction.
. Incoming Speaker Alan peter Cayetano
hopes to avoid
the 2019 House_senate
conflict that cai.jsed the budget delay.
The House and Senate, he said', must be
abie to clearly define what is.'Dork bar_
rel" which the Supreme Court banned in
2014 and agree on a national budqet on
time, that is, before the start of 20-20.
Once thc national budget is approved
by Congress and signed by the presi_
dent, according to the Supreme Court,
rawmakers cannot intervene or partici_
pate in the impletuentation of any proj_
ect listed in the budget. This is to avoid
the old practice of lawmakers getting
huge commissions - 20 percent or even
more - from public works contractors
chosen to carry out the proiects.
In the delayed 2019 n;tional budget,
some p75 billion had been appropiiaied
ror.projects in specific districts, placed
in the bill by the congressmen of those
distrlcts. \Sqnators sought to remove
these jtems,..claiming they were ,,pork
barrel." Finally, after three months of
disagreement, the disputed budqet was
approved and sent to president buterte
for his signature. He simply vetoed the
F76-billion projects.
There is indeed need to avoid the
.huge. allocations
that some congress_
men in the past managed to include in
the national budget but, surely, there
are worthy projects that some con_
gressmen seek for their districts.
It
coutd be just a matter of definition, of,
clarification, between thd senators and
congressmen,
Incoming Speaker. Cayetano has
rarsed the problem early in the hope,
which..we all share, that this old ,,pbrk
barrel" issue will not delay the national
budget - with all its unwanted conse_
quences - as it did last year.
P*aE<f