|
By Jomar Canlas, Reporter
House Speaker Prospero Nograles wants students
to understand what are the so-called pork barrel funds and how
lawmakers spend that money.
He asked the Department of Education to help
distribute to pupils and teachers a pamphlet entitled
“Understanding the Pork Barrel,” which he co-authored with Albay
Rep. Edcel Lagman, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.
The pamphlet can be included as reading material
in pupils’ social studies subjects and could be distributed to
various business organizations, nongovernment organizations,
tri-media agencies and other sectors to help the public better
understand the “pork barrel,” Nograles said.
The House of Representatives wants to initiate a
campaign to refute the misconceptions about the “pork barrel.”
This is also an item in the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF)
website that is being developed, intended to allow public access to
the fund allocations of each congressman.
Nograles urged his colleagues in the House to
conduct information dissemination in their legislative districts as
to where “pork barrel” funds go and how important it is to
countrywide development.
Nograles added he enjoins “all my colleagues
to conduct public or town hall meetings with their district or
party-list constituencies to explain the utilization of their
Priority Development Assistance Fund.”
The House Speaker added that most people fail to
see that the relatively small projects implemented under the fund
complement national programs.
“It is the pork barrel funds that take care of
small, but very vital projects in the countryside—farm-to-market
roads, small bridges, classrooms in remote barrios, markets,
scholarships for the underprivileged, medicines and countless
requirements in the rural areas,” he said, saying his colleagues
“just have to work harder and bring government closer to our
people.”
Nograles lamented that most people believe that
the Countrywide Development Fund (another name for the Priority
Development Assistance Fund) is a cash allocation personally given
to congressmen for their unlimited discretionary disposition without
any constraint or accountability.
“This is a complete misconception which must
be corrected,” Nograles said. “Members of Congress neither
handle the funds nor implement the projects.”
Currently, each congressman of the lower house
is entitled to a P70-million “pork barrel,” while each senator
is entitled to P200 million.
The lawmakers’ authority under the law, he
said, is limited to the identification of projects and designation
of beneficiaries, subject to a specific menu. The implementation is
also undertaken by the appropriate government agency after an open
public bidding.
|
