|
By Efren L. Danao, Senior Reporter
Editor’s note: The first part reported
that nearly 50 well-crafted laws cannot be fully implemented for
lack of funding.
Last of two parts
Senator Pia Cayetano was ecstatic with the
enactment of Republic Act 9337 or the Reformed Value-Added Tax Law.
It contained her pet amendments earmarking 50 percent of the share
of local government units from the incremental revenue from the
Reformed-VAT to education, health insurance premiums, environmental
conservation and agricultural modernization.
This provision is similar to her earlier
contribution to Republic Act 9334 or Sin Tax Law, earmarking a
percentage of the incremental revenues to the Department of Health
for its disease-prevention program and to the Philippine Health
Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) to sustain the goal of universal health
insurance coverage.
When a fund is earmarked, it could not be used
for other purposes. Yet, the supposed beneficiaries of the earmarked
funds received a mere pittance.
Cayetano sought an explanation from Budget
Secretary Rolando Andaya Jr. why the earmarking stated in the two
laws was not followed. His answer was simple: “Because it was not
in the General Appropriations Act.”
Andaya explained that there may be laws needing
funds, but as long as these funds are not contained in the annual
budget, then they are not assured of getting funded.
Who to blame
Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, the chairman of the
Senate Committee on Finance, said lawmakers are to blame for failing
to identify their funding sources.
“Government cannot allocate funds for programs
provided for in laws that do not identify their funding source.
Congress has to get the Bureau of Treasury to identify the source of
funds to support statutory grants. But if there are no funds
available, they shall remain unfunded until the executive department
provides otherwise,” he explained.
He added that different people have varying
notions about what things that need priority.
“While the authors of the statutes considered
them as important projects for the government, the administration
might decide things according to its perception of what society
needs during its watch, given the limited resources of government
and the need to prioritize and allocate funds for projects,”
Enrile said.
The problem with this situation is that it gives
the executive department complete leeway to determine which law
should be funded and by how much—assuming the government has money
to spare.
More laws needed
Senator Loren Legarda, principal author of the
Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000, said there should be
specific criteria for laws to qualify for funding. She wondered why
there is lack of urgency or compelling reason to fund important
pieces of legislation.
Senator Francis Escudero said that although
Congress has the power of the purse, the executive department enjoys
a wide latitude and discretion to spend even on projects and
programs not included in the budget. This presidential power stems
from a martial law decree, Presidential Decree 1177, ironically
called the Budget Reform Decree of 1977. This decree grants the
executive the power to realign or augment budgets of the various
executive departments, besides providing for the automatic
appropriation of foreign debts.
There are now bills seeking to amend this law to
give Congress the absolute and exclusive power of the purse. Among
the proponents of the amendatory bills are Senators Edgardo Angara,
Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Jinggoy Estrada, Pia Cayetano and Escudero.
But until this law is repealed or amended, Congress could only
assure the full implementation of the 46 unfunded laws by including
them in the next national budget.
Legarda said she would sit down with Andaya to
determine which of the 46 laws could get the needed funds in the
2009 budget. This, however, did not stop her from expressing concern
over the way the executive department has set its priorities which
ignored the efforts of Congress that enacted the laws with good
intentions.
Her concern was echoed by a resource person at a
hearing on the implementation of the Ecological Solid Waste
Management Act when it was learned that the law had never received
the P20 million it was supposed to get each year, said Odette
Alcantara of Earthday Network Philippines.
She lashed out at the lack of priority given by
government to the law. “The desire to implement the law is not
there, otherwise the budget would have been there. It is not funded
so it cannot be prioritized, much less institutionalized.”
|
