BUDGET Secretary Benjamin Diokno said Wednesday there was no need for Congress to pass a P10-billion supplemental budget that would help rebuild war-torn Marawi City despite Malacañang’s apparent support for it.
On Tuesday, Deputy Minority Leader and Kabayan Party-list Rep. Harry Roque filed House Bill 5874 or the Tindig Marawi Bill appropriating a P10-billion supplemental budget to provide humanitarian assistance to the victims of the siege in Marawi by the Maute terrorists.
“We’re now halfway through the 2017 budget, so we are actually finalizing the 2018 budget and factoring in whatever is happening right now,” Diokno told CNN Philippines.
“Six months from now we will have a new budget, so I don’t see the need for a supplemental budget at this time.”
Diokno said the government had yet to see the full extent of the damage as a result of the ongoing siege in Marawi City.
But Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella said the supplemental bill would complement President Rodrigo Duterte’s planned executive order that would allot another P10 billion to help Marawi recover from the armed conflict there.
“In anticipation of the rehabilitation of Marawi, Congress has proposed a P10-billion supplemental budget to rebuild Marawi through House Bill 5874 or the Tindig Marawi Bill,” Abella told reporters.
“It is therefore a very welcome development and this complements an executive order for Bangon Marawi, which is awaiting PRRD’s approval.”
Roque said the proposed budget would likewise be used to rehabilitate destroyed infrastructure, properties and businesses.
He said the measure would supplement the “declared intention of the Executive department” to allot P10 billion for the rehabilitation of Marawi.
The appropriated amount would be released to the Department of National Defense, Department of Education, the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Social Welfare and Development and the National Housing Authority.
“While many efforts have been successful in properly evacuating innocent civilians from the zone of conflict, the government must plan and appropriate funds towards the rehabilitation of Marawi City and the restoration of peace and order within the area,” Roque says in his explanatory note.
“As such, the purpose of this bill is to appropriate a supplemental budget specifically earmarked for Marawi City in order to expedite its recovery from the ruins of war and return to ordinary civilian life.” With PNA