COMMONSENSE
By Marichu A. Villanueva
The Philippine Star
By Marichu A. Villanueva
The Philippine Star
Five more days to go and we will have a new roadshow that will commence with the convening of the 16th Congress starting Monday. Following tradition, the new set of senators and congressmen will hold a joint opening session that will be capped by the annual State of the Nation Address (SONA) at the Batasan Pambansa in Quezon City.
This will be the fourth SONA for President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III since assuming office three years ago. In what could be a pre-SONA hoopla, we are again seeing the specter of scandals and scams ready for the picking by lawmakers out to squeeze every media mileage out of such controversy.
Already, resolutions are filed left and right in both the Senate and the House calling for investigations of this and that controversy “in aid of legislation.” Ironically, several senators and congressmen are among those implicated in the latest scandal involving the use of their “pork-barrel” allocation in the annual budget.
Dubbed as Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), the lawmakers themselves provide for their “pork-barrel” allocation in the annual budget bill submitted to both chambers for approval. A senator is allocated P200 million worth of PDAF while congressmen, including party list representatives, get P70 million each in the yearly budget.
In the latest scandal involving “pork barrel” allocations, ex-Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile, acting Senate President Jinggoy Estrada and Senators Ramon Revilla Jr., Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Gregorio Honasan along with several congressmen were dragged into alleged channeling of their PDAF to “fake” non-government organizations (NGOs).
Whistleblowers (again) claimed a certain businesswoman, by the name of Janet Lim Napoles, supposedly organized a number of NGOs. Former employees of Napoles accused her of setting up foundations using them as dummies. They claimed up to 60 percent of PDAF funds given to the foundations were offered as kickbacks.
All the senators implicated as well as Napoles denied any involvement in the alleged misuse of millions in PDAF.
Jumping into the fray, Senators Franklin Drilon, Miriam Defensor-Santiago and Chiz Escudero have separately called for a full-blown legislative investigation into these allegations. Escudero called for an inquiry by the Senate Blue Ribbon committee to show the public that Congress has nothing to hide when it comes to the use of its PDAF.
Drilon, who is acknowledged as presumptive Senate president in the incoming 16th Congress, suggested that the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) rather than the Senate conduct an investigation for obvious reasons. Santiago, on the other hand, said she would rather have an independent prosecution panel, appointed by the President, to handle this latest scam in government.
Looking at how things are developing, something tells us this is more political than anything else. It is not just coincidence the implicated senators all come from the opposition ranks.
Thankfully, the Office of the Ombudsman beat them all to the draw. Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales announced yesterday her office has taken cognizance of these alleged misuse of PDAF and would investigate “motu propio,” or on its own volition even without any actual complaint or graft case filed before them.
The Ombudsman, as the independent constitutional body, is right venue for this case, if only to put everyone in their proper places. However, the Ombudsman may have to recast her planned probe team composed of six graft investigators, which she tasked to coordinate with the NBI. This is because certain NBI agents were also implicated in extortion complaint reported by Napoles to the Office of the President.
After spending two sets of 11-hour “marathon” meetings at Malacañang last week to scrutinize and go through the P2.268-trillion proposed budget for 2014, it behooves President Aquino and his Cabinet to make sure a huge part of it is not wasted, if not lost to corruption.
Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Secretary Florencio Abad disclosed that some P27 billion of this proposed budget account for the annual PDAF allocation for members of the 16th Congress.
Explaining the process of disbursing PDAF allocations, Abad said senators and congressmen submit to the DBM requests for the release of their funds. He, however, assured the public the DBM makes sure that the projects are consistent with those listed in the priorities of the Aquino administration as spelled out in the approved budget law for that year.
Appearing at the ANC TV talk show program yesterday, the DBM Secretary admitted the PDAF are not seen in the budget. A former congressman himself, Abad confirmed the practice that congressional allocations for PDAF are tucked in the annual budgets of concerned agencies.
That’s where the transparency vows do not apply. This is the cookie jar that all of them in Congress have dipped their fingers on, including those who claim they do not get any PDAF allocations at all.
Abad clarified though the DBM does not release the pork barrel funds of senators and congressmen directly to foundations and NGOs. The implementing agencies, he pointed out, have the option of undertaking the projects themselves, or hire NGOs to implement them through a memorandum of agreement. The lawmakers and the agencies are allowed to identify the NGOs, to which the funds are then given.
Hence, the lawmakers and implementing agencies are ultimately responsible for whatever irregularities in the use of the funds, Abad stressed.
“Pork barrel” allocations of lawmakers are not bad per se. It only becomes unpopular because of these reported abuses and misuse of taxpayers’ money. We can, as vigilant citizens, help monitor the use of these public funds. We can check PDAF releases real time by checking the website dbm.gov.ph then click e-releases and PDAF.
After scandals in the past Congresses over the same issue on the reported misuse of “pork barrel” funds by lawmakers, it has been renamed so many times. It used to be called countrywide development fund (CDF). Then it was later called Poverty Alleviation Fund. Now, it is called PDAF. A “pork” by a name smells the same, so to speak.
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