EDITORIAL — Budget monitoring

The 20th Congress begins deliberations this week on the proposed P7.2-trillion national budget for 2027, amid controversy over the “leadership fund” granted to every senator in the previous Congress.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson, who has long scrutinized the national budget for potential red flags, has also said he has detected lump sum appropriations embedded in the proposed national outlay. Lacson is expected to provide details in the coming days.

While the Supreme Court has ruled that not all lump sum appropriations are unconstitutional, the leadership fund and Lacson’s report make it all the more important to monitor the budget process as congressional deliberations get underway.

In a society where it is safe to presume regularity in governance, the budget process need not be subjected to minute scrutiny. But because of the gross abuses and institutionalized thievery that have been uncovered in connection with the crafting of the annual outlay in previous years, the nation can no longer take lawmakers’ promises of budget transparency at face value.

Former public works secretary Manuel Bonoan had testified last week at the Sandiganbayan that all the 24 senators in the previous Congress were allocated P500 million each in the 2025 budget as “leadership fund,” with the chairs of certain committees getting up to P1 billion.

Taxpayers have yet to find out how those funding allocations were utilized by the senators. The chair of the public works committee at the time, Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr., currently faces graft and malversation charges in connection with alleged kickbacks he received for endorsing flood control contracts. In a controversial move, the Sandiganbayan’s Third Division allowed him to post bail for the malversation case.

In the meantime, members of the current Congress have stressed that there is no more leadership fund in the General Appropriations Act for this year, and there will be none in the GAA for 2027.

For the 2026 GAA, deliberations at the House of Representatives were opened to civil society organizations and other budget watchers. Confidential funds were limited to civilian offices with law enforcement or security functions. But the bicameral conference still remained closed to the public at various critical moments.

And despite public monitoring, the current Congress still approved pork barrel-type outlays in the GAA, among them the unprogrammed appropriations and the so-called health pork barrel, MAIFIP or the Medical Assistance for Indigent and Financially Incapacitated Patients.

When it comes to the handling of public funds by lawmakers and the executive, eternal vigilance is the price of fiscal prudence.