Weak checks let Congress turn flood control into patronage – ex-DBM chief

MANILA, Philippines — Flood control projects are being used as patronage tools for political gain over public safety and making it easy to misuse budgets meant for disaster prevention, former Department of Budget and Management (DBM) chief Florencio Abad said.

Citing the importance of executive oversight, he said a weak checks-and-balances system lets Congress keep exploiting projects and boosting their political power and personal gain, while initiatives like flood control fail to deliver the intended benefits to the public.

“When politicians get involved, the politicians’ minds aren’t on the water management project. Just like what’s happening now, instead it is on how to make money and how to benefit for the election, so the motivation is different instead of what should be the goal of the project,” Abad said in an interview with Christian Esguerra’s Facts First program.

The former DBM official said many flood control projects suffer from poor construction and are repeatedly damaged by storms. Unfinished works are often blamed on typhoons, underscoring inefficiencies and the persistent vulnerability of infrastructure to natural disasters.

“And maybe another big thing they put in place is what we can say about the projects for reelection, the patronage projects like the multipurpose buildings we hear about in the Senate, local roads, small projects that their voters will be happy about,” Abad said.

Due to alleged anomalies in the government’s flood control projects, the Department of Finance reported that the government may have averaged P118.5 billion economic loss from 2023 to 2025.

Based on the 2026 National Expenditure Program, funding for flood control projects was supposed to have P274.9 billion but President Marcos ordered its removal, citing that its current budget for this year remained unspent.

Abad said the weak checks and balances and executive inaction allowed the legislature to dominate, expanding its power and benefits over three years without any pushback.

“If the executive does not intervene, Congress will continue its actions, as their power expands first, followed by the growth of their personal or political benefits,” he said.

The former official warned that without accountability, repeated neglect not only increases losses, but also encourages officials to disregard the law and forget their responsibilities to the public. — Keisha Ta-Asan and Marco Luis Beech, The STAR