EDITORIAL - Transparency, accountability

The administration has defended the allocation of about P10.14 billion for confidential and intelligence funds in the proposed national budget for 2024. Such assurances must be matched by actions that will allay public fears of the CIF being used mainly to skirt transparency and accountability in the utilization of people’s money.

In general, the public can understand the need for confidentiality in the use of public funds for intelligence gathering on matters of public safety and national security. Government auditing rules are relaxed in these cases.

Confidentiality, however, must be kept to a minimum when it comes to handling public funds. The country has stringent laws against the misuse of people’s money, and these laws must be properly applied, ensuring that public funds are utilized for their intended and officially specified purposes. State auditors have also stressed that even CIF is subject to general auditing regulation.

Of the P10.14-billion CIF in the P5.768-trillion 2024 national expenditure program proposed to Congress by the executive branch, the bulk or P4.5 billion is allocated to the Office of the President, including a higher outlay for overseas trips.

The Department of National Defense will get P2.68 billion. The Department of the Interior and Local Government, which supervises the Philippine National Police, Bureau of Jail Management and Penology and Bureau of Fire Protection, is allocated P906.62 million in CIF while the Department of Justice, which oversees prisons and the National Bureau of Investigation, is getting P471.29 million.

Most controversial is the P500 million in CIF allocated to the Office of the Vice President, plus another P150 million to the Department of Education, which is headed concurrently by Vice President Sara Duterte. Some quarters are asking why P150 million is being set aside for confidential purposes when public schools lack almost everything from classrooms to teachers and school supplies.

The Department of Information and Communications Technology will get P300 million while the Department of Agriculture, which President Marcos concurrently heads, will get P50 million. The rest of the CIF is divided among several other agencies.

Some critics have likened the CIF to the congressional pork barrel that the Supreme Court had abolished for being unconstitutional. The SC had prohibited the earmarking of projects for funding after the annual General Appropriations Act has been passed. Use of the CIF goes beyond this, the critics says, because it allows a degree of secrecy in the use of people’s money.

The issue, like the pork barrel, may also end up in court. The executive should not wait for a court ruling in reassuring the nation that public funds are being used judiciously, with transparency and accountability.