The brave words of legislators to remove all lump sums from the 2026 national budget that were convertible to the pork barrel failed to hold after Senate President Pro-Tempore Panfilo Lacson revealed that several conduits for irregularities existed.

Lacson has moved to cut P2 billion from what he described as “redundant” right-of-way (RoW) appropriations under the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), while pushing for structural reforms aimed at curbing corruption in the agency’s 2026 budget.

Such allocations are paid to private property owners affected by the infrastructure buildup.

Lacson also said allocable funds in the proposed budget were more troubling than the defunct pork barrel system, noting they could have cost the government an estimated P180 billion or more through “ghost” flood control projects.

Allocable funds first appeared in 2022 and allowed amounts to be set aside before specific projects were identified, Lacson explained.

He described the practice as “whimsical” and called it baseless, with money allocated before any project was proposed.

He declared: “This is definitely far worse than the pork barrel system, such as the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), that required project proposals before funds were released.”

The Supreme Court ruled in 2013 that the PDAF and similar pork barrel schemes were unconstitutional.

Under “allocables,” however, allocations precede project identification, undermining the established process.

Lacson warned that this new scheme — enshrined in the 2025 budget — funnels massive sums to lawmakers, party-list groups, and even “non-legislators,” including former officials.

Based on his scrutiny, the 2025 budget assigned as much as P143.5 billion in allocables to the House leadership alone.

The senator’s warning comes amid a broader investigation into alleged anomalies in the flood control projects, many of which have been flagged as “ghost” or overpriced schemes.

Lacson emphasized that the pattern of fund misuse is not isolated: systemic corruption appears to enable inflated budgets, repeated insertions, and duplicate project allocations, raising the risk of the widespread diversion of public funds.

He urged Congress and oversight bodies to require project proposals first — before appropriations — and to increase transparency by exposing who files budget insertions. 

Otherwise, he warned, allocables may become another backdoor for the massive misuse of public funds.

Delete suspicious items

During the period of amendments for the proposed 2026 national budget, Lacson sought to delete P1 billion from the DPWH’s “various completed projects for the payments of RoW” and another P1 billion from “various ongoing projects for the payments of RoW,” both lodged under the national or central office.

“The Nationwide/Central Office’s Payments RoW appropriations are redundant, as funds are already allocated regionally. If these funds are essential, they should be allocated to the relevant regions,” Lacson said.

He proposed reallocating the trimmed amount to augment funding for key sectors, such as education, the judiciary, and transportation.

Among the amendments he introduced were the transfer of P2.7277 billion from Tulong Dunong to the Tertiary Education Subsidy; an allocation of P30 million for UP NCPAG’s Governance Reform, Innovation and Transformation Collaboratory (GRIT Labs); a P90.991 million increase for the Anti-Red Tape Authority; P400 million for the Department of Transportation’s Cordillera regional office; P243.79 million for the Supreme Court’s Judicial Integrity Office; P223.664 million for the Court of Appeals, whose proposed budget had faced major reductions in the National Expenditure Program; and P28.5 million for the Development Academy of the Philippines’ Graduate School of Public and Development Management.

Meanwhile, Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, who presided over the Senate finance subcommittee handling the DPWH budget, thanked Lacson for “helping the committee find resources” for priority programs.

Beyond budget realignments, Lacson also pressed for new special provisions meant to institutionalize long-term anti-corruption safeguards in infrastructure planning and implementation.

He proposed that the DPWH be required to update its design manuals for highways, bridges, and flood control structures, noting the need for climate-resilient and modern engineering standards.

“By ensuring that the design manuals for key infrastructure are updated and consultative, we can foster foresight, strategic and climate-smart development in DPWH’s project implementation,” he said.

Lacson likewise urged the adoption of a five-year roadmap for digital planning, design, construction, maintenance, and management, including the full integration of Building Information Modeling (BIM) in government infrastructure projects.

The BIM, widely used in other countries, provides a digital representation of a facility’s physical and functional characteristics, allowing for tighter project monitoring, reduced leakages, and enhanced transparency.

“Recent events demonstrate that the scale, complexity, and fragmented nature of infrastructure projects create the opportunity for corruption,” Lacson said. 

“It is therefore an opportune time to adopt a technology that will ensure efficiency, transparency, and integrity in our infrastructure projects,” he added.