A legislator on Saturday asked the Department of Budget and Management to immediately release the P3.9 billion needed to equalize the pensions of retired Philippine National Police and the defunct Integrated National Police.
In a statement, Party-list Rep. Francisco Datol of Senior Citizen, said allowing the case “to drag on any further would only convey the image of a DBM that is heartless and relentless against old, weak and dying former policemen cast aside after they have served the country. Do not wait for another retiree to die without receiving their due benefits.”
The Court of Appeals earlier upheld the ruling of Branch 32 of the Regional Trial Court in Manila that the government should immediately pay the pension differential of the INP retirees.
The CA Special 14th Division ruled: “The appropriation law is clear that the release of funds shall be based on the list of eligible INP retirees with the corresponding computation of their respective retirement benefits and pension, duly authenticated by the PNP, which shall be submitted to the DBM for validation of the computed benefits… Likewise, the PNP and DBM need not await the verification from GSIS before releasing the funds.”
“Considering the INP retirees’ advance years, they can hardly afford another protracted proceeding and the courts should frown upon any attempt to deprive them of the fruits of the final and executory verdict.”
The DBM and the PNP questioned the RTC order which applied the list of INP retirees and their respective pension amounts submitted by PNP for implementation of the pension payment.
The CA rejected the bid of PNP and DBM to wait and apply a list from the Government Service Insurance System instead of the PNP list in the payment of pension differentials to the INP retirees.
The PNP and DBM claimed that the participation of GSIS in the payment of retirement benefits is necessary as it is the only agency that can provide the pension history of the INP retirees.
“The more important issue here is the moral duty of the State to care for the retirees who dedicated their lives and most productive years in public service and for love of country,” Datol said,
The appellate court explained that the payment of retirement benefits to INP retirees with equal amount given to PNP retirees had already been affirmed with finality by the Supreme Court and that Congress had also appropriated funds for this purpose by enactment of Republic Act 10633.
The CA likewise ruled that the RTC was correct in rejecting petitioners’ plea to withhold the payment of the pension to INP retirees pending submission of the list from GSIS.
“The appropriation law is clear that the release of funds shall be based on the list of eligible INP retirees with the corresponding computation of their respective retirement benefits and pension, duly authenticated by the PNP, which shall be submitted to the DBM for validation of the computed benefits… Likewise, the PNP and DBM need not await the verification from GSIS before releasing the funds,” it stressed.
“Considering the INP retirees’ advance years, they can hardly afford another protracted proceeding and the courts should frown upon any attempt to deprive them of the fruits of the final and executory verdict,” the ruling added.
