Lawmaker hits CCT budget hike

MANILA, Philippines - A party-list lawmaker questioned yesterday the planned P45 billion budget for the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program next year.

Gabriela party-list Rep. Emmerenciana de Jesus described the proposed CCT allocation, which will eat up two-thirds of the proposed P67 billion budget of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, as “a growing monster of deception in the face of 2013 electoral spending.”

“The Aquino administration is once again poised to bloat its CCT monster of a budget for 2013. By so doing, it continues to cultivate the culture of mendicancy. It continues to deceive the population that CCT is the way out of poverty,” De Jesus said.

The P45 billion budget is an increase of 30 percent from the P34 billion allocated for the CCT program this year.

“The Aquino administration has not proven any long-term positive impact of CCT on the lives of its beneficiaries, so why increase the budget now? Isn’t it a suspicious coincidence that the proposed marked increase comes at a time when electoral spending will once again shoot up?” De Jesus said.

“We very well know that the only way out of poverty is to create and implement strategic economic programs such as building a national industry and a genuine agrarian reform program,” she added.

De Jesus said the Gabriela party-list group remained firm in its stand that when the government provides employment, “the woman can feed her family, send the children to school, and provide for the basic needs of the family.”

She said even as the Aquino administration “insists on throwing scraps of food to the poor and refuses to build national industries and forward a genuine agrarian reform program, Filipino workers and farmers as well as other marginalized sectors of society should stand firm in demanding that the government account for its failure to deliver on the promise of a life of dignity for every Filipino.”