The country's top investigation agency is now broke.
With continually dwindling funds, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is set to lay off 126 men or about half of its casual employees and implement austerity measures to save money.
"We have no choice," said NBI Director Federico Opinion. "With our budget further slashed, we would have to maximize our finances and make sure everybody would receive their salary in the next 12 months."
For this year, the NBI was given P526 million, some P18 million less than that of 1999. And more than half of this budget would be spent on salaries alone.
The bureau has complained of an acute shortage in manpower. Ideally, it needs some 5,000 investigators but it only has 425 at present. Some of its provincial offices do not even have a single lawyer, Opinion said.
The NBI also owes the Philippine Long Distance Telephone (PLDT) company about P500,000 in telephone bills. It used to have a P3.9 million debt to PLDT, the main reason why its lines were cut in the middle of last year.
"Our austerity measures would include the switching off of lights not in use and a ban of computer games during brakes to save on electricity. I will issue memoranda to this effect, we would have to adopt to these difficult times," said Opinion.
NBI budget division chief Nellie Enriquez said 126 of its 320 casual employees will be laid off. Based on the budget program she has prepared, P317 million will be spent on personnel services while P197 million will go to maintenance and operating expenses. The remaining P12 million, on the other hand, will be used for buying new equipment.
Opinion, however, assured that their limited funds would not affect the performance of his men. The NBI intelligence fund is also down to P12 million -- to be taken from the operating expenses fund. It will be divided to about a dozen NBI regional offices nationwide.
"There is no excuse for our NBI investigators not to do their jobs. During my time we never even had the amenities of transportation that the agents have today," he said.
Opinion explained that the NBI will not be able to buy sophisticated investigation tools this year. The bureau bought 23 cars last year from the money given by President Estrada.
The NBI had been pushing for the passage of its proposed P10 billion modernization fund spread out over five years.
Meanwhile, Opinion poised administrative sanctionsyesterday against three of his men who reportedly fired at least some 21 bullets into the air after failing to get a woman they wanted to sit beside them in a Binondo music lounge last Saturday.
"I will order their investigation for grave misconduct simultaneous with criminal charges filed by police against them," the NBI chief said.
Grave misconduct is punishable by dismissal.
Three NBI agents, namely Larry Dominguez, Jonathan Galicia, and Oscar Cabebe, reportedly caused panic after they fired their guns outside the Xiamen Music Lounge along Tamabacan street, in Binondo, Manila Saturday. They were allegedly drunk.
"The bureau will not tolerate this kind of behavior," Opinion assured.