House of Representatives Approves Duterte’s 6 Billion Peso Budget for 2018, No Questions Asked

With the staggering amount of opposition and criticism that President Rodrigo Duterte has been receiving lately, it’s pleasantly surprising to know that the his Php 6 billion proposed budget had been approved yesterday by the House of Representatives yesterday without anyone raising a question.

Executive secretary Salvador Medialdea who led the hearing submitted the three-page briefer containing information about the proposed budget. Included in the document are details showing that the budget for the Office of the President would drastically go down from this year’s Php 20.2 million to just Php 6.031 billion for next year.

Also, one other good news is that salaries will go up by Php 286.7 million, from the current Php 707.4 million to 994.2 million next year.

However, the budget for maintenance and other operating expenses will receive a huge cut from Php 19.3 billion down to Php 4.7 billion. On the other hand, the allocation for capital outlay will be more than doubled from the Php 180.7 million to Php 370.2 million or a total increase of Php 189.5 million.

This speedy approval of Duterte’s budget, according to Davao City Representative Karlo Nograles, was a manifestation of the courtesy the House of Representatives was extending to the President.

What’s most surprising about this particular budget hearing is that even the party list representatives, of which some are usually the loudest critics of the president, waited until after the hearing and the approval of the budget before voicing out their opinions about it.

For example, Bayan Muna Representative Carlos Zarate told reporters that they were requested to not ask questions by Nograles, but they were also informed that they could propound questions during the plenary debates on the budget.

Zarate said he would have wanted to ask where Duterte would use the Php 2.5 billion intelligence fund that the president had proposed to retain.

“Is he using it in his bloody anti-drug war?” Zarate asked. “Since there are at least 10,000 drug suspects so far killed, at P10,000 per kill, the total amount of rewards would come up to between P100 million and P150 million. Those are very big sums. Where are they getting the money?”

One would ask why he agreed to keep silent on the matter instead of asking outright though, since party list representatives are not generally known for their silence.

As of this writing, the increase in salaries and the budget for capital outlay have both not yet been explained in detail but would much likely be dissected in the coming plenary debate.

Source: PhilStar