MANILA, Philippines - The annual P200-million pork barrel fund of Vice President Jejomar Binay is apparently not covered by President Aquino’s order for the abolition of the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).
What are clearly covered are the allocations of Binay’s two lawmaker-daughters: Nancy, who is allocated P200 million a year as a senator, and Abigail, who has P70 million at her disposal as representative of Makati’s second district.
A vice chairman of the committee on appropriations of the House of Representatives, who did not want to be identified, said Aquino’s order does not cover Binay’s pork barrel fund.
“His annual P200-million fund is not part of the PDAF, which is the congressional pork barrel and which the President ordered abolished. It is included in the budget of the Office of the Vice President,” he said.
“That is a good question to raise,” Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said when asked if Aquino’s order applies to Binay’s “pork.”
“I will not comment anymore,” he said when pressed to elaborate on his statement. Abad, a leader of the ruling Liberal Party, hinted that Binay’s supporters might put political color to whatever he says.
Headlines ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1 For this year, Binay has a budget of P416.6 million, P200 million of which is his pork barrel fund, plus an additional P85 million for “subsidies and donations.”
According to the budget law, the P200 million “shall be used to fund the priority programs and projects of the Vice President.”
“Provided that not more than 50 percent shall be used for education, health, social protection, and/or tourism programs and projects, and not more than 50 percent for infrastructure programs and projects,” the law states.
This means that Binay’s fund is divided into P100 million for what lawmakers call “soft” projects and P100 million for “hard” projects. This is also how a senator’s annual P200-million PDAF allocation is split.
The budget law further provides that the Vice President’s pork barrel fund is subject to the same project menu and other limitations and requirements as the PDAF allotments of senators and congressmen.
The budget lists the projects that Binay and members of Congress can fund with their pork barrel.
The PDAF is a P25-billion lump sum in the annual budget. Senators and congressmen submit their project listing together with the proposed funding to the Department of Budget and Management, which then releases the money to implementing agencies.
It turned out that these agencies, according to the special Commission on Audit report on pork barrel funds, transferred P6.2 billion of such funds to non-government organizations (NGOs), most of them bogus, upon the behest of lawmakers.
Rep. Binay gave P8.1 million to Dr. Rodolfo Ignacio Sr. Foundation.
Of the P6.2 billion that went to NGOs, the transfer of P1.741 billion was covered by specific requests from three senators and 32 House members, belying the claim of some of them that they did not endorse the NGO-recipients of their funds.
Under Aquino’s order, the PDAF would no longer exist in the national budget starting in 2015. Instead, senators and congressmen would be required to propose their projects in advance so these could be itemized in the outlay under the agencies that would implement them. No fund transfers to NGOs would be allowed.
According to critics, the itemization of lawmakers’ projects means that the pork barrel would be retained with a different name and phraseology.
In Binmaley, Pangasinan, Binay said protesters in Rizal Park were right to feel indignant about the massive embezzlement of PDAF by some lawmakers and their cohorts.
“People were angry at PDAF because of graft and corruption, ghost NGOs, ghost congressmen,” he told local newsmen after distributing relief goods to flood victims.
“I have to be emphatic about, there is graft and corruption, the main packing includes PDAF which is the source of corruption,” he said. “The issue here is not the PDAF but graft and corruption, the process of what happened that painted a bad image to the PDAF.”
He said the government should make sure the guilty are punished.
He said his office had earned recognition from COA for its judicious liquidation of its expenses. “Let’s be vigilant together so there will be transparency,” he said. - Eva Visperas