The Senate approved on third and final reading a measure authored by Senator Bam Aquino that seeks to use blockchain technology to make government budget documents fully transparent and publicly accessible.
The Citizen Access and Disclosure of Expenditures for National Accountability Act, known as the CADENA Act or the Blockchain the Budget Bill, was passed on Monday through Senate Bill No. 1506.
“There are laws whose time has come, and this includes the bill we filed on the disclosure of public documents… I believe that if there were no turmoil now, it would not have been passed, but because this is what the times demand, it has a chance of being approved,” Aquino said.
The bill was approved unanimously with a vote of 17-0, with no objections and no abstentions recorded during the plenary session.
Its passage came days after the measure was included in the latest list of priority legislation endorsed by the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council (LEDAC).
Under the proposed law, all government agencies would be required to upload and regularly update detailed budget-related documents on a centralized Digital Budget Platform.
The required disclosures would include contracts, project cost breakdowns, bills of materials, procurement records, and other supporting documents tied to the use of public funds.
By using blockchain architecture, the system aims to prevent retroactive alteration of records and allow citizens, auditors, and watchdog groups to track how government money is spent.
The bill also provides for administrative and criminal penalties against public officials who fail to disclose required documents or who submit false or misleading information.
A counterpart measure, House Bill No. 6761, was filed in the House of Representatives by Negros Occidental 3rd District Rep. Javier Miguel Benitez.
“We are calling on our colleagues in the House to fast-track the passage of the CADENA Act as support for our shared goal of eradicating corruption in government and ensuring that funds from the people’s taxes go where they properly belong,” Aquino said.
