Both houses of congress ratified the Bicameral Conference Committee Report of the 2021 proposed national budget today.
The main focus was the allocation for vaccines against the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) and the calamity fund. Hopes are high that the vaccines against the deadly virus will be available to the Philippines by next year and lawmakers assured that this will be well-financed.
Senator Sonny Angara disclosed that ₱72.5 billion have been allotted for the COVID-19 vaccine, ₱70 billion in unprogrammed funds, and ₱2.5 billion worth of programmed funds.
A budget will also be sourced from the Bayanihan 2, which aims to extend the validity next year worth ₱10 billion. In sum, it will be over ₱82 billion set aside for the vaccine alone.
“As promised by President Duterte and the leaderships of Congress, we have come up with a budget that is very responsive to the urgent needs of our countrymen, particularly the COVID vaccine where we allocated about ₱P70 billion and the rehabilitation of areas hit by the typhoons where we put ₱23 billion,” House Deputy Speaker Rep. Mikee Romero said.
This is the response of the leaders of Congress to President Rodrigo Duterte’s prodding to come up with a budget that the country needs.
Meanwhile, House Appropriations Panel Chairperson Eric Yap assured having ironed out the issue on infrastructure projects.
“Hindi talaga malabo ipantay-pantay. Mayroon iba’t ibang terrain. It depends kung saan may malaking build. 3 times lumulobo ‘yung distrito na ‘yun (It is very possible to align everything. There may be different terrains. It depends on the big build. That district has ballooned three times times.” Rep. Yap disclosed.
Top 10 Recipients
Based on the data released by Sen. Angara, the Department of Education (Dep Ed) has the biggest chunk of the budget, followed by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of National Defense (DND), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD)…
The Department of Health (DOH) comes in at 6th, followed by the Department of Transportation (DOTr), Department of Agriculture (DA), the Judiciary and Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).
The controversial budget for the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) was placed on status quo with a proposed amount of ₱16-billion pesos.
Senate Committee on Finance Chairperson Sonny Angara assured that the Bicam abided by the decision of the Supreme Court regarding the pork barrel.
“Ang rule naman ng Supreme Court diyan must not negate the executive power to veto. We comply to that. There is no post enactment on the part of legislators,” Sen. Angara explained.
Rep. Yap and Sen. Angara are both open to the possibility that President Duterte may veto some provisions of the 2021 national budget. Are confident that the deadline will be beaten by Congress so that there will be no repetition of the reenacted budget for the coming year.
