When it comes to our country's fiscal policy, it is not just the president who directs it. It is a shared responsibility between the executive and the legislative branch. In the executive, it is President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and his economic team, while in the legislative branch, it is Congress that passes laws and appropriates spending for fiscal policy measures.
It is also the Philippine Congress, through participation, deliberation, and approval of the House of Representatives and the Senate, which passes new tax laws for revenue generation. Since Congress bears the burden of generating new revenues, it can direct where revenues are spent.
Therefore, we defer to the legislature's decision when it comes to spending. We should defer its decision on how to appropriate the Confidential and Intelligence Funds or CIFs. After all, these are expenditures of the government and are public funds.
Ideally, our government should be treated as a business to grow. There should be prudence in spending when it comes to expenses that do not involve creating development and progress.
Confidential and Intelligence Funds are necessary spending for our common defense. This is the true nature and the ultimate purpose of the CIFs. They are strictly for national security and defense. This is why secrecy is required for their use, and the law gives a considerable leeway in their liquidation.
The sound policy, therefore, is to strictly allocate CIFs to agencies mandated to protect us in the five domains of warfare — land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace. They should be allocated with definitive standards and parameters, such as the degree of threats, the value of tools needed, etc. Of course, the president, as the commander-in-chief, is necessarily afforded the fund.
With good governance and public accountability as the measures:
I am against the Office of the Vice President being allocated the CIFs because the Vice President has no duty under the Constitution that requires them to secure our common defense. I have nothing against Vice President Sara Duterte. I am just against civilian agencies being accorded with secret funds.
Necessarily, I am against the DepEd, the DTI, DoTr, and other civilian departments being allocated with CIFs. It should strictly be allocated only to civilian agencies with defense duties, national security, law enforcement, and operations responsibilities.
I am against local government units allocating CIFs in their budget. I saw a chart of the LGUs that allocated for themselves the use of confidential funds, and it was really bothersome. There should be no secrecy in spending the LGUs' budget. Every item should be open for audit and properly liquidated as the regular funds.
I get that there is the element of maintaining peace and order in local communities by local executives. But indeed, maintaining peace and order in the town or province is part and parcel of the duty and responsibility of the local government executive. They do not need a secret fund to do that job.
Whatever will be the future direction of Congress on confidential and intelligence funds, the ultimate standard should be that of good governance and prudent fiscal policy.