Senate to defend P152-M CIF realignment in bicam —Gatchalian

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian said Sunday that the Senate is expected to justify its realignment of at least P152 million worth of confidential and intelligence funds (CIF) for various government agencies during the bicameral conference committee meeting on the proposed 2023 national budget.

In a Super Radyo dzBB interview, Gatchalian was asked how the Senate could convince the bicam panel on proposed realignment.

Earlier the Senate approved the realignment of P152M from the CIF to several agencies’ maintenance and other operating expenses (MOOE).

As the Senate and House of Representatives have different versions of the proposed P5 trillion-plus national budget for next year, Gatchalian said that the confidential fund realignment has to be justified.

“Dahil Senado ang nag-tapyas ng confidential funds, obviously ipaglalaban ‘yan ng nag-approve o nagdagdag. So doon pag-uusapan ano ba ang justification,” he said.

(Since the Senate was the one who slashed the confidential funds, obviously those who approved or added will fight for that. We will talk about what the justification is.)

“Pangalawa, saan kukunin ang pondo? Dahil tinapyasan, inilagay na sa ibang programa, hindi mo naman pwedeng tanggalin ‘yung pondo sa ibang programa dahil kawawa naman ‘yung ibang programa,” he added.

(Second, where will the funding come from? Because it was taken from and placed in another program, you can't just remove the funds from the program it was intended for.)

The confidential funds that were realigned to MOOE as adopted by the Senate are:

• P100 million from the Department of Education
• P5 million in the Department of Foreign Affairs
• P19.2 million in the Department of Justice
• P2 million in the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
• P6 million in other executive offices
• P20 million in Office of the Ombudsman

During the first day of the bicameral conference meeting to reconcile the versions of the national spending plan, Senate finance committee chairperson Sonny Angara said that the realignment of confidential and intelligence funds (CIF) would remain a point of contention, even as he expressed confidence that everything would be resolved.

The Senate and House contingents designated and authorized Angara and House appropriations committee chairman Elizaldy Co to discuss and reconcile the differing provisions.

Angara said Congress is expected to come up with a reconciled version of the 2023 budget bill this coming week.

Senator Risa Hontiveros, on the other hand, expects that the bicameral conference committee would keep the revisions made by the Senate minority. She also said she was confident that Angara would push for their amendments in the final version of the 2023 budget. —LBG, GMA Integrated News