Lawmakers to question changes in 2015 budget proposal

MANILA, Philippines - Bayan Muna Reps. Neri Colmenares and Carlos Zarate said yesterday they would question the budget errata or changes submitted by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to the House of Representatives.

“We have just received a copy of the 269-page errata of the 2015 national budget and it is as we feared, the DBM undermined the power of Congress by passing errata that have never been deliberated upon in the committee or plenary level,” the two said in a statement.

“We have never deliberated on such items as the P423-billion fund for the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), the P8-billion contingent fund for the Bangsamoro or the P3.281 billion for the APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) or even the P1.6 billion for the Department of Finance-Bureau of Customs as with other items,” they said.

“This is a whole new budget and if they do not subject this to deliberations based on our rules then we may be forced to go to the Supreme Court. The court should prohibit this practice so that the people’s coffers would not be raided by unscrupulous politicians,” they said.

They said they would question the changes during tomorrow’s third and final reading voting on the proposed P2.606-trillion 2015 national budget.

Colmenares and Zarate attached to their statement a copy of the letter of Budget Secretary Florencio Abad to Davao City Rep. Isidro Ungab, appropriations committee chairman, dated Oct. 3, which contains the errata.

In his letter, Abad said the changes were prompted by modifications of performance targets, disclosure or provision of targets which were not provided at the time the budget proposal was submitted “due to lack of information at that time,” and increase in budget provisions due to additional requirements of programs or projects.

He said there were also reallocations within and across allotment classes (personal services or salaries, maintenance and other operating expenses and capital outlay), provision of details of some projects under the grassroots participatory budgeting program (GPBP) and revisions in the general and special provisions for clarity of purpose or intent.

Over the weekend, Ungab said the budget errata “were scrutinized and approved by the small committee (on amendments, which he also heads).”

He said the House, after passing the budget on second reading last month, created the select committee, named its members from the majority and minority, and authorized it to receive and approve amendments.

He said among the changes his panel adopted “were the disaggregation of GPBP projects, since it was pointed out during the committee and plenary (debates) that there were a number of GPBP projects still to be identified that were categorized as various projects.”

He added that the select committee also approved and adopted certain realignments in department or agency budgets “as an offshoot of questions raised during the appropriations committee hearings and plenary deliberations.”