3 kinds of pork in 2026 budget

The 2026 national budget contains three types of pork barrels – soft, hard and shadow – totaling P641 billion.

Executive and legislative officials inserted the illegal pork despite public fury over fake and faulty flood works.

President Bongbong Marcos proposed and Congress allies increased the illegal allocations. The Supreme Court outlawed pork barrels in 2014 for being discretionary lump sums which lawmakers, not executive officials, disburse.

Soft pork is patronage politics. Parked in executive agencies, P218 billion will be released via guarantee letters from lawmakers or opaque Cabinet uses.

People’s Budget Coalition, of 40-plus civil society groups, identified those as:

• MAIFIP or Medical Assistance to Indigent and Financially Incapacitated Patients, P51 billion at Dept. of Health;

• AICS renamed Protective Services for Individuals and Families in Difficult Circumstances, P63 billion at Dept. of Social Welfare and Development;

• TUPAD or Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa ating Disadvantaged at Displaced Workers, P25 billion at Dept. of Labor and Employment;

• PAFF or Presidential Assistance to Farmers and Fisherfolk, P10 billion at Dept. of Agriculture;

• Tulong Dunong political ayuda to college students, P2 billion at Commission on Higher Education;

• FALGU or Financial Assistance to Local Government Units, P37 billion at Dept. of Budget and Management;

• GEF or Growth and Equity Fund for Local Governments, P11 billion at DBM;

• NTF-ELCAC or National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict, P8 billion at DBM;

• CIF or Confidential and Intelligence Funds even in non-security or law enforcement agencies, P11 billion.

BBM proposed P24.24-billion MAIFIP, P27.03-billion AICS and P12.14-billion TUPAD in his National Expenditure Program. The Senate-House bicameral conference committee late last December said there should be strict rules on fund releases to avoid utang na loob of beneficiaries to politicos. But before any rules were crafted, they more than doubled the political ayuda.

PBC asked BBM to minimize patronage by issuing rights-based guidelines for release. Also, to put on hold NTF-ELCAC and unnecessary CIF. Lastly, to transfer MAIFIP to inadequately funded PhilHealth.

PBC identified P180-billion hard pork – repeat or overpriced infrastructure projects from which to draw kickbacks.

These include flood, bridge, roadworks under Dept. of Public Works and Highways; farm-to-market roads under DA; irrigation ditches under National Irrigation Administration and super health centers under DOH.

“Cut the fat from hard pork,” PBC asked BBM. “Order science- and nature-based update of DPWH manuals that influence around P600 billion in infrastructure projects.”

DPWH wasted P1.7 trillion in ghost, substandard, overpriced flood works since 2015. High officials, district engineers, crooked contractors and politicos partook of the plunder. Only two big fish – the Discaya contracting couple -- have been jailed so far.

DA limits farm-to-market roads to P1.5 million per kilometer, but some got away with P300 million. Only half of 600 super health centers are functional; the rest are unfinished. DPWH built only 22 of 1,700 classrooms targeted in 2025.

Shadow pork consists of P243-billion unprogrammed appropriations.

These are supposedly standby projects to be funded with new taxes and loans, excess fees and unexpected earnings.

PBC asked BBM to veto the entire UA because “releasable with minimal transparency or legislative scrutiny.” Lawmakers can convert the entire amount into soft and hard pork that they can plunder. This was done when UAs were P807.16 billion in 2023, P731.4 billion in 2024 and P531.7 billion in 2025.

BBM proposed P249.9-billion UA for 2026.

Congressmen reduced it to P243 billion in October. They removed P6.766-billion Public Health Emergency Benefits and Allowances for Health Care and Non-Health Care Workers. They also realigned funds within the remainder.

Senators further reduced UAs to P174.56 billion. They took out five House-approved social programs and slashed AFP Modernization from P50 billion to P30 billion.

The bicam restored everything back to P243 billion.

Last Monday BBM vetoed P92.5 billion, but kept P150.5-billion UA.

Soft, hard and shadow pork impoverish Filipinos.

*    *    *

1Sambayan and other civil society groups demand the return of P107 billion that government took from Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp in 2024.

That money was contributed over the decades by bank depositors. It ensures them up to P1 million in case a bank collapses.

Congress inserted in the 2024 budget a rider directing the Dept. of Finance to take money from government-owned and -controlled corporations. Then Finance Sec. Ralph Recto took P60 billion from PhilHealth and P107 billion from PDIC for flood projects.

Documents later exposed most of those flood works as fake, faulty, overpriced. The Supreme Court declared unconstitutional both the Congress rider and Recto’s act. It ordered the return of PhilHealth’s P60 billion on petition of health care reformists and academics.

1Sambayan and allies say that even if the Supreme Court ruled only on PhilHealth, depositors’ money in PDIC is covered.

Recto “refunded” PhilHealth’s P60 billion via the 2026 national budget. Critics say people were already robbed of P60 billion but were made to pay for it with their tax money. PhilHealth’s P60 billion should be refunded from illegal profits confiscated from flood works. Same with PDIC’s P107 billion.

*      *      *

Catch Sapol radio show, Saturdays, 8 to 10 a.m., dwIZ (882-AM).

Follow me on Facebook: https://tinyurl.com/Jarius-Bondoc