Andaya: No post-enactment identification of items in proposed 2019 budget

House Majority Leader Rolando Andaya on Wednesday assured that all amendments in the proposed P3.757-trillion national budget will be itemized and that nothing will be identified after the General Appropriations Bill (GAB) for 2019 has been passed into law.

Andaya made the remark after ACT Teachers party-list Representative Antonio Tinio questioned what he called are "lump sum" funds in the realigned allocation for the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH).

"The approved amendments in the budget will be itemized. There will be no post-enactment identification which is prohibited. Spelled out dapat," Andaya said in a message to reporters.

During the convening of the Committee of the Whole on Tuesday, Tinio took note of the supposed lump sum funds amounting to P31 billion realigned for the DPWH.

"These are lump sums with no details. And so, based on previous experiences with the PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund) and the corruption related to the approval of such lump sums, I am concerned that no details are being provided. What are these projects? Where will they be implemented?" he said.

Andaya said every line in the GAB will comply with laws and judicial decisions on public expenditures. "Ang importante is that we are opening the budget deliberations to improvements," he said.

He cited the Senate as an example, where at the end of a budget hearing for an agency, some senators would call for an increase of the budget of a certain program, or question the cuts.

"The Senate is not calling for the rubber-stamp approval of the budget. And when they propose changes, they view it as vigilance, while when the same thing is done by the  House, it is met by suspicion. Mali naman yata yun," he said.

Andaya admitted, however, that there are funds that are difficult to  itemize, such as the budget for retained health workers as it is impossible to create a "payroll."

"In the case of the Calamity Fund augmentation for [Typhoon] Ompong rehabilitation, there is no comprehensive damage assessment yet which can guide as to what projects will be undertaken," he said.

With many demands and few resources, Andaya stressed the importance of budgeting, which he said is "modern day equivalent" of the biblical "miracle of feeding a multitude out a single loaf of bread."

"There might not be enough budget space to accommodate appeals for inclusion in this very tight 2019 budget like, for example, any deficiency in the Bangsamoro Organic Law, and many more. One suggestion worth exploring is to put all of these in the Unprogrammed Fund," Andaya said.

The House of Representatives on Wednesday began its plenary deliberations on the proposed 2019 national budget after a two-day delay. —KBK, GMA News