President Rodrigo Duterte’s 2018 budget gets a 70-percent decrease from its record-high expenses in the past year, the proposed P3.767-trillion budget showed. From a high of P20.030-billion budget in 2017—the Office of the President gets to spend a budget of around P6.031 billion for 2018, but still much higher than the P2.82 billion in the last year under the previous administration.
Senior Deputy Executive Secretary Menardo Guevarra attributed the decrease with the country finishing off with the chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations this year—wherein more than P15.5 billion were allotted.
For 2018, the OP’s traveling expenses will be down to more than P884-million from P2.1 billion in the last year. Confidential and intelligence expenses will remain the same at P1.25 billion, while extraordinary and miscellaneous expenses rose to P19.8 million from 12.06 million the past year.
Professional services, meanwhile, will amount to P302-million, down from P2.1-billion while representation expenses likewise lowered to 8.9-million from 10.09-million in 2017. On the other hand, the OP’s other expenditures are communications expense (P103 million from P1.3 billion in 2017); professional expenses (P302 million from P2.1 billion in 2017); and rent/lease (P111 million from P2.3 billion in 2017). Salaries for OP personnel amount to P1.035 billion while capital outlay is at P370-million.
Palace communications meanwhile, are being handled by the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO), which has a separate budget.
With the changes on how the budget is being presented —presidential oversight programs get more than P3.69 billion; presidential advisory programs is at P56.39 million; some P34.44 million will be allocated for presidential legal and legislative services; and presidential executive staff services programs will amount to P1.119 billion.
As part of the President’s oversight programs—the Office of the Cabinet Secretary gets a new line item in the 2018 budget with more than P4.68-million appropriation, allocated for “locally funded project(s).”
Sought for clarification, Assistant Secretary to the Cabinet Jonas George Soriano said that the OCS willnot be funding “local projects,” as the name suggested, but rather a coined term by the DBM to describe the CabSec’s expanded powers, focusing on participatory governance.
“We’re not funding local projects, but is simply fulfilling the mandate of our office under EO No. 1, and EO No. 99,” Soriano told Manila Standard in a phone interview. “DBM is simply looking for a term for a line item to describe the CabSec’s functions.”“The budget will go to the 8888 [anti-corruption hotline], efforts for participatory governance, oversight of the 12 agencies [under CabSec] and our emergency response feedback,” he added, detailing the allocation for next year.
Meanwhile, Vice President Leni Robredo’s budget gained a slight increase of less than 4 percent to P443-million in 2018, from her P428.618-million budget in the previous year.
A big chunk of Robredo’s budget, or more than 86 percent will go to her good governance programs at P382-million. Her travelling expenses likewise lowered from P29.9 million from P37.2-million in the previous year.Salaries for OVP personnel amount to P57-million while capital outlay is at P11 million.
The new budget is a 12.4 percent increase from 2017 and represents 21.6 percent of the country’s GrossDomestic Product (GDP). Across sectors — Education, which consists of the Department of Education, Commission on Higher Education (CHED) and State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) will be getting the highest appropriation at P691.1-billion; followed by the Department of Public Works and Highways (P643.3-billion); Department of the Interior and Local Government (P172.3-billion); Department of Health (P164.3-billion); Department of National Defense (P145-billion); Department of Social Welfare and Development (P138-billion); Department of Transportation (P73.8-billion); Department of Agriculture (P54.2-billion); Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (P33.5-billion); and Department of the Environment and National Resources (P27.9-billion).