With the budget season here and our future ostensibly lying in the hands of our leaders who are duking it out to get the funding they think our national agencies deserve, we are urged to look closely at what our dear lawmakers are prioritizing these days.
It may sound as if the floors of Congress had been windswept and tattered after a few spicy exchanges that made the headlines, but then two great controversies swept in anew. The Alice Guo hearings and Apollo Quiboloy fracas make our ears ring, but we are undeniably tuned in.
These are issues tied up with so many other issues, but Guo is not going anywhere with her pronouncements. And when the Davao pastor takes the hot seat by next week, we must brace ourselves for some typhoon-level storms, as he is closely associated with the Dutertes.
Unfortunately, the budget hearing for the Office of the Vice President happened just about the time the pastor was in hiding, and Sara Duterte may have gotten her fair share of pointed questioning, as she went on the defensive.
There will be more to come. Discussions on the proposed budgets for the different agencies take place from August to October. Both the House of Representatives and the Senate will likely approve the proposed 6.352-trillion 2025 national budget — so we should still keep a close eye on the government’s spending plan for next year in spite of “exciting” developments in other matters.
The year is drawing to a close. Was the P5.768-trillion national budget for 2024 well spent? A report says it gave the biggest slice to “social services and economic services sectors” that “support the priorities and policy directions of the Marcos administration’s 8-Point Socioeconomic Agenda and are aligned with the Philippine Development Plan 2023-2028.”
It is not likely that the average Juan would be able to tell if the country has posted significant economic growth this year, as pronounced last December by National Economic and Development Authority Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan.
It’s hard to tell if the budgets are really spent well for services to the people, and we must then rely on our agencies to deliver their mandates and promises. We must hope that appointees to their posts would use their wisdom and experience to bring improvements and change to departments and agencies wallowing in inertia.
During her visit to the DAILY TRIBUNE offices not long ago, Tourism Secretary Christina Frasco regaled the editors with the story of how she approached the tall job given to her by the President.
“When I first came into the fold of the Department of Tourism, that was the first thing I asked. How much is our budget for tourism roads? Not the usual question you would expect. Because the focus is always how much is our budget for tourism promotions. But, ako, coming from local government, I know for a fact that you can promote as much as you can, but if it’s difficult to access, and when they do get there, the experience is not ideal with the lack of restrooms, and the accessibility is a challenge, the pricing is a challenge, then you will never be able to increase your global competitiveness. So our yearning has been for more investment in tourism roads. So when we came in in 2022, we found that the budget that had been allocated for tourism roads was devoted to continuing roads, meaning existing roads that they refurbish, expand or rehabilitate — no budget for new roads meaning no opportunities for emerging and less-known destinations to be accessible. So we lobbied heavily with the Department of Public Works and the Department of Budget and Management to provide funding for new roads. We got it in 2024.”
This is how we should assess whether our leaders are not just talking but, more so, thinking and doing.
This is how we must look at the national budget — whether funds are being allocated properly to improve long-suffering agencies like those working to address climate change, food security and even weather forecaster PAGASA, which has been calling for attention more than the thunderstorms in the chambers of government.