The Supreme Court has deferred taking action on the petition filed by a group led by Camarines Sur Rep. Rolando Andaya seeking to compel the Department of Budget and Management to release the fourth and final tranche of salary increases for state workers.
During its en banc session on Tuesday, the SC resolved to defer deliberation on Andaya’s petition for next week, particularly the issuance of preliminary mandatory injunction against DBM and Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno.
“The Court reset its deliberations (on the Andaya petition) for 22 January 2019,” the SC Public Information Office said in a media briefer.
An SC insider explained that the SC magistrates did not see the need to immediately decide on the plea in the petition.
In an advisory, the tribunal said it has reset the deliberation on the matter on Jan. 22.
Diokno had already said that the fourth tranche would be released next month once Congress passes the General Appropriations Act of 2019, which he said is necessary to fund the salary increases that would amount to P42.7 billion for the entire year.
The DBM chief also said that the increase for January of government workers would be covered by the funds to be released upon the passage of the GAA.
Andaya’s petition filed last Monday asked the Court to compel the DBM to implement the salary adjustment schedule even with the government using a reenacted budget for the meantime due to delayed passage by Congress of the GAA for this year. With PNA
The petitioners argued that the release of the fourth tranche under Executive Order 201 signed by former president Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III in 2016 should be a ministerial duty on the part of the DBM.
Andaya and about 50 other government employees cited two alternatives for the DBM to cover for the P42.7 billion necessary for the fourth tranche of increases – the Miscellaneous Personnel Benefits Fund (MPBF) and the savings from the re-enacted 2018 budget.
The petitioners pointed out that the MPBF currently has P99.446 billion, which is “allowed to be used for payments of personal benefits, such as deficiencies in authorized salaries, bonuses, allowances, associated premiums and other similar personnel benefits of National Government personnel, among others.”
The petitioners also revealed that P75 billion from the MPBF fund is allotted for “Payment of Compensation Adjustment” and “Funding Requirements for Staffing Modifications and Upgrading and Salaries,” which could be used by the DBM for the fourth tranche of salary increases.
They also suggested that the DBM may get just one-fourth of the required funding for the fourth tranche of about P10.676 billion “to cover for the first three months of 2019… considering that the 2019 GAA may still be passed within the first quarter of the year 2019.”
As a second contingency, the petitioners said the DBM may utilize the savings under the reenacted 2018 national budget.
Diokno earlier explained that the fourth tranche could not be immediately released due to the delayed congressional approval of the proposed P3.757-trillion national budget for 2019, saying the GAA is a necessary “legal basis” for such funding.
Andaya and Diokno have recently been entangled in conflict after the House leader accused the DBM chief of inserting P51 billion in allegedly anomalous road projects in the 2019 budget.
Diokno had said that he welcomes the filing of the suit by Andaya, pointing out that the implementation of the re-enacted budget, which affected the release of additional pay for state workers, among others, would not have happened had lawmakers done their jobs.
“Many of these problems could have been avoided had Congress just approved the General Appropriations Act,” he said.
Diokno said he had expected Congress to approve the proposed P3.757-trillion 2019 national budget by February and once approved DBM will then release the differential on workers’ pay.
Andaya, however, argued that there was no basis for the DBM to withhold the release of funds since there are available alternative sources for the pay hike despite the delay in the passage of the 2019 General Appropriations Act (GAA) or the reenactment of the 2018 budget. With PNA
