Unmask pork enablers

Unmask pork enablers | Daily Tribune

Officials of the Executive branch and Congress’ bicameral conference committee (Bicam) are under scrutiny after budget watchdogs and health advocates petitioned the Supreme Court to have the government subsidy returned to the state firm Philippine Health Insurance Inc. (PhilHealth).

Removing PhilHealth’s subsidy was rationalized as a penalty since the agency failed to utilize earlier state financing efficiently, with Senate President Chiz Escudero saying that removing the subsidy served as a “wake-up call.”

Escudero and Senate finance panel head Grace Poe pointed to the P600 billion in reserves that PhilHealth should utilize first, rather than securing a state subsidy.

This came after the Bicam met to source funds for the unprogrammed appropriations (UA) that would be the conduit for the pork barrel of the legislators, mainly for their campaign funds.

The Bicam reversed an initial proposal of P74.43 billion for PhilHealth, which was later reduced to P64.42 billion by the Senate before it was scrapped entirely. Thus, the action of the legislature undermined the Universal Health Care (UHC) law and punished the vulnerable populations instead of PhilHealth.

“Even while the UHC had yet to be fully implemented, Congress failed to fully allocate PhilHealth’s share of sin taxes, and the Executive failed to remit to PhilHealth its mandated share of Pagcor and PCSO revenues, in clear contravention of the Constitution, the UHC Act and Sin Tax laws,” the petition filed in the Supreme Court last Friday read.

The government is mandated to apply subsidies and earmark revenues for PhilHealth under the UHC. The Supreme Court was asked to decide if Congress’ budgetary discretion could override specific legal mandates.

The petitioners argued that PhilHealth’s reserves, while substantial, were dwarfed by its P1.252-trillion insurance liabilities. Its depleted reserves, after the government denied its subsidy, has put PhilHealth at risk of insolvency, the averred.

Removing the subsidy penalizes the poor who cannot sustain their PhilHealth contributions, shifting the financial burden to the direct contributors who may face higher premiums and reduced benefits.

The withdrawal of financial support also contradicted the UHC’s goal of equitable access to healthcare, which may worsen the health disparities in the population.

The Bicam’s act was tantamount to denying PhilHealth more than P130 billion in funds after P60 billion was taken by the Department of Finance which branded it as excess funds.

PhilHealth, thus, has become the favorite target for budget diversion due to the huge amount of money it keeps, which should be utilized only for health purposes.

Without the subsidies, medical groups said PhilHealth may struggle to cover the premiums for the 16 million indirect contributors, which could result in reduced benefits for them and delayed reimbursements to hospitals.

In effect, the removal of the subsidies will discourage healthcare providers from seeking PhilHealth accreditation due to reimbursement delays.

Poe and Escudero, who are strong political allies, should explain how the PhilHealth allocations were juggled.

The petitioners also sought the creation of a special account by the Bureau of the Treasury to ensure that the sin tax and the Pagcor and PCSO contributions to the UHC are fully remitted to PhilHealth.

Meanwhile, PhilHealth should answer for its collusion with some Cabinet members and legislators to build up a massive pool for pork barrel projects.

Transparency is needed, which requires Escudero and Poe to disclose where the PhilHealth subsidy that was already provided in the 2025 budget went.