DPWH’s unclean hands

DPWH’s unclean hands | Daily Tribune

The craving for pork by members of Congress, which brought on President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s rant in his State of the Nation Address, has worsened over time.

Even legislators who have been monitoring the abuse of the budget pointed out the brazen manner by which the 2025 General Appropriations Bill was manipulated to satisfy the greed for kickbacks and percentages.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson said he wanted the insertions in the national budget from 2013 onwards reviewed.

The year is pivotal since it was when the Supreme Court (SC) declared unconstitutional the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) or the legislative pork barrel.

“Members of Congress were able to skirt the High Court’s decision which primarily barred the post-enactment identification of projects through insertions,” Lacson asserted.

He held that even in the National Expenditure Program (NEP) or the Executive’s budget, pork barrel projects, which contractors and suppliers drive, are already embedded.

These contracts are not aligned with the development programs of the government because they are based on the whims of lawmakers.

The SC decision pointed out the constitutional mandate of Congress to enact laws, not to implement projects, a function that belongs to the Executive branch.

“When the NEP is transmitted to Congress, the legislator who sponsored the insertion can increase the appropriation because of the power of the purse of the legislative branch,” Lacson indicated.

Thus, the implementing agency that received the insertions does not even have an idea about the projects because they were not part of the planning process.

The result was that the final draft of the 2025 budget “mangled the NEP beyond recognition,” based on the description of the President.

Lacson, however, said the President making good his warning in his State of the Nation Address that he would return the budget proposal to Congress, even to the point of reenacting the General Appropriations Act (GAA) of the previous year, has its own danger.

“If we do not have enough time after the President exercises his veto power on the entire General Appropriations Bill, the government will be forced to use a reenacted budget, which will make matters worse,” he said.

“All of the funds in the reenacted P6.326-trillion budget become a lump sum fund the use of which will be under the discretion of the President, turning it into the pork barrel of the executive branch,” according to Lacson.

A reenacted budget also signals instability in the budgeting process, which can erode public and investor confidence in the administration’s ability to govern effectively.

A budget without direction could negatively impact economic growth, credit ratings, and foreign investment.

The virtual surrender of the Department of Public Works and Highways to the contamination of its budget by the pork barrel was a revelation. DPWH Secretary Emmanuel Bonoan conceded that flood control projects, which are the favored pork conduit of legislators, are beyond the oversight of the agency.

The height of incompetence, however, is that Bonoan, as head of the agency, admitted that he can’t do anything about it.

As DPWH chief, the buck stops at his office. If Bonoan refuses to exert an effort to find a solution, he becomes part of the problem that must be removed.