Audit of Senate ‘pork’ eyed

The rift between lawmakers worsened yesterday after a senior leader of the House of Representatives called for an audit of the P4.6 billion in pork barrel funds reserved for the 23 members of the Senate.

In an apparent effort to get even with the Senate in their conflict over various issues, House Majority Leader Prospero Nograles of Davao City took the initiative to call on the Commission on Audit (COA) to conduct an audit to determine where and how the pork barrel funds of senators have been spent.

"We are now constrained, on behalf of the members of the House of Representatives, to also request that the yearly P200 million projects and funds of senators be audited as well by the COA," Nograles suggested.

The request was possibly in retaliation for the Senate’s earlier probe into an alleged P728-million fertilizer scam, which detractors of President Arroyo claimed was diverted to local officials and used to finance her campaign in the May 2004 presidential election.

The recent Senate probe directly named congressmen and local officials, along with other government officials cited in alleged anomalies involving fertilizer purchased by the Department of Agriculture in 2004.

The opposition-dominated Senate took further action by asking COA to "undertake an audit of the fertilizer funds and the alleged misuse of the Marcos wealth" which the government has recovered from Swiss banks and earmarked for the Agrarian Reform Program.

Congressmen and senators have been at loggerheads over several issues, starting with the proposed shift to a unicameral Congress, the conflicts over an increase in state workers’ pay and some 30 vital bills that have been "gathering dust" in the upper legislative chamber.

As government auditors have done in the past regarding the priority assistance development funds of House members, Nograles requested COA chief Guillermo Carague to also conduct an audit into senators’ Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), pegged at P200 million each.

House members periodically report to COA how and where their respective PDAFs are being spent in district projects.

"Where and how our PDAF funds were spent in our districts are presented to our people in project billboards, reports to the people in full-page newspaper ads and/or newsletters distributed to our constituents," Nograles said.

Senior House leaders insisted the annual amount of P200 million in pork barrel funds allocated for each senator should be subject to an official COA audit and its results made public to end speculations about the misuse of pork barrel funds.