I don’t know how people regard the impasse between Malacañang and the House of Representatives over the 2019 national budget. In my view it’s a choice between self-interest and the common good.
The House want to retain the obligation-based budget, on which this year’s budget is based. Meanwhile, the Department of Budget and Management prepared a cash-based budget for 2019.
The period of implementation of the obligation-based budget can be for 24 months and even longer. For the cash-based budget, it is only for the fiscal year—12 months.
The period of payment for obligation-based budget is 24 months and beyond; for the latter, 15 months.
The reason Budget and Management Secretary Benjamin Diokno is insisting on a cash-based budget is that fiscal risks involved. If a project goes beyond the fiscal year and not completed and paid for within 15 months, government deficit will balloon.
On the part of the House, the longer period of implementation and payment, the better. This is where the crux of the problem lies.
If the 2019 budget does not get enacted this year, the administration will have to live with a re-enacted national budget—what it got this year. If this happens, President Duterte will be the one to approve projects proposed by members of Congress.
This means members of Congress will be lining up at the office of Secretary Diokno.
And to think that 2019 is an election year, my gulay.
A re-enacted budget will have dire consequences for the people.
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President Duterte and the proponents of the shift to federalism must come to terms with the fact that the proposal is dead in the water.
The reasons? No more time. Plus, the draft prepared by the consultative committee still has to be refined to avoid what our economic managers consider a fiscal nightmare.
This is actually a blessing in disguise. It will give Congress more time to assess what is good.
This is of course aside from the fact that the people still need to understand what the proposed system of government is about.
As they say, there is a time for everything. Obviously this is not the time for federalism.
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I listened to the whole Senate blue ribbon committee hearing on the P60-million advertising contract between PTV4 and the Tulfos’ Bitag program. The Tulfos are the brothers of former Tourism secretary Wanda Teo.
Defintely there was conflict of interest. The DOT contract was in effect between sister and brother. I can’t buy the claim of Teo that she did not know that her brother was the other party in the contract. Bitag is a blocktimer of PTV4.
I also cannot accept the excuse of Ben Tulfo that he was not aware, either, that the contract was with his sister.
Why did the geniuses at PTV4 even place that contract? I smell a rat!
The Senate should look into the millions of pesos in government advertising in print and broadcast. I know there are shenanigans going on in the placement of ads. Ask advertising people.
For one thing, why should the government even advertise unless it is selling something?
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Speaking of graft and corruption, the Office of the Ombudsman should look into the findings of the Commission on Audit saying that government lawyers in the Office of the Government Corporate Counsel are getting excessive allowances from the GOCCs they are assigned to. This is in violation of the law that prohibits them from having allowances over half their annual salaries.
Recall that even the Office of the Solicitor General was flagged for violating this law.
This practice must not continue—unless Malacanang has one set of rules for its allies and another for its opponents. If this is the case, then the Duterte administration is not at all different from its immediate predecessor.
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Would you believe that many books in public schools contain glaring errors? For instance, the Banaue Rice Terraces is identified as Banana Rice Terraces, or the island of Samar is called Cebu.
This is just unacceptable!
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