Justice Brion: DAP a presidential amendment of 2011 GAA

Associate Justice Arturo Brion agreed with the Supreme Court majority ruling that the Disbursement Acceleration Program violated the principles of checks-and-balances, and separation of powers, as well as the prhibition against the transfer of appropriations.

 

"[National Budget Circular No. 541 that authorized the DAP] fostered a constitutional illegality: the premature withdrawal of allotments... clearly amounted to a presidential amendment of the 2011 GAA and a unilateral veto of an item of the GAA without giving Congress the opportunity to override the veto," Brion said.

 

Brion also agreed with the majority ruling's position on the doctrine of operative fact, saying that authors, proponentsband implementors cannotninvoke the doctrine and should prove they acted in good faith before the proper tribunals.

 

In a decision announced Tuesday, the Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional the following portions of the Aquino administration's DAP:

 

- the withdrawal of unobligated allotments from the implementing agencies, and the declaration of the withdrawn unobligated allotments and unreleased appropriations as savings prior to the end of the fiscal year and without complying with the statutory definition of savings contained in the General Appropriations Act;

 

- the cross-border transfers of the savings of the executive to augment the appropriations of other offices outside the executive; and

 

- the funding of projects, activities and programs that were not covered by any appropriation in the GAA.

Justice Arturo D. Brion


—NB/JDS, GMA News