Undying hunger for pork

In a landmark ruling in 2013, the Supreme Court declared the pork barrel system unconstitutional, mainly the Priority Development Assistance Fund, or PDAF, that provided yearly to each senator P200 million and each House member P70 million “for projects.”

The decision was pivotal since it invalidated all forms of lump sums in the yearly national budget.

The insertions included in the budget that a former senator identified in the 2024 budget serve as a warning about the various devices used to manipulate the General Appropriations Act to extract illegal pork.

The SC ruling was an offshoot of the P10-billion PDAF scam that tagged several Senate and House members who had misused their pork barrel.

The SC decision barred “various congressional insertions and other similar practices that allow legislators to intervene, assume or participate” in the various phases of project implementation.

Any reinterpretation by members of Congress of what was explicitly stated in the ruling should be clarified with the SC.

Moreover, the decision required the government to prosecute those violating the ruling.

It also stated the need to “investigate and prosecute all government officials and/or private individuals for possible criminal offenses related to the irregular, improper, and/or unlawful disbursement/utilization of all funds under the pork barrel system.”

Insertions in the National Expenditure Program before the budget proposal is submitted to Congress have become the common route for the pork barrel after the SC struck down the PDAF.

Technically, insertions in the Executive’s budget proposal are outside the High Court’s ruling since what was expressly prohibited were post-enactment interventions.

Going by the intent of the ruling, however, the SC disallowed all forms of discretionary funds.

In the 2024 national budget, several items may be considered as lump sums since they do not have a program of work.

This implies that these allocations have a different purpose than what was indicated in the General Appropriations Act. It falls under post-legislation implementation, which the Tribunal’s ruling prohibited.

Senators raised suspicions over the P26.7-billion Ayuda para sa Kapos ang Kita, or AKAP, program as the source of funding for the People’s Initiative, or PI, offensive for Charter change but several other lump sums such as the Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Disadvantaged/Displaced Workers, or TUPAD, and the Assistance to Individuals In Crisis Situations or AICS that the senators distribute are of the same character.

“It is not the obligation of congressmen and senators to distribute these subsidy programs. That is illegal since the mandate of Congress in the budget process is to authorize and legislate and not to implement,” said former Senator Ping Lacson, who was known as a budget watchdog.

Even in the disallowed pork barrel practice, money does not pass to the legislators, but they identify the projects and the implementors.

Early each year, there is a budget call, which sets in motion an intricate and thorough process if it is followed.

The trouble is that the cycle through vested interests has evolved, and once it reaches the bicameral conference committee stage, the pork barrel items are mangled beyond recognition.

In the implementation stage, the members of Congress who proposed the pet project secure the funds, which are then included as an item in the national budget.

What follows is the unspeakable gains that, in effect, have kept the pork barrel system well and kicking despite the SC outlawing it.

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Credit belongs to: tribune.net.ph