Ombudsman seeks more funding for personnel, assistance centers

The Office of the Ombudsman (OMB) on Tuesday requested additional funding for the creation of more casual positions and to set up more Ombudsman Assistance Centers (OAC) in different parts of the country.

During the hearing of the House Committee on Appropriations, Assistant Ombudsman Adorie Cornito said the office is requesting P36 million for the creation of casual positions for digitization of records and P93.6 million for six additional OACs.

“This funding is crucial for implementing the digitization of prior year records, which will help preserve the essential documents from degradation and facilitate easier access to record retrieval,” she said.

“Furthermore, this initiative would effectively reduce the cost associated with the physical file storage while simultaneously enhancing the data protection, security, and control,” she added.

The Ombudsman has a proposed budget of P6.23 billion or only 0.0941% of the proposed P6.7-trillion national budget for 2026.

Ombudsman Jose Balmeo Jr. said they recently hired around 200 personnel. He said this when asked what the office is doing to resolve its backlog of 950 fact-finding cases as of July.

“We have a total of 210 newly hired personnel, this would include lawyer and non-lawyer… and this would greatly complement our efforts to speed up the fact-finding and other investigation of our office,” he said.

“Our main dilemma or obstacle in filling up positions in the OMB is the office space that we have. We are so cramped in our office here in Quezon City,” he later added.

Balmeo welcomed the suggestion of lawmakers to rent or lease an office instead of allocating funds for the purchase of another lot.

Meanwhile, Committee Vice Chairperson Brian Poe raised the issues that the Ombudsman has yet to allocate funds for the newly formed special panel of prosecutors that will investigate anomalous flood control projects.

“Because the panel was formed only recently, itong September, sigurado ako wala pa ‘yan sa budget ng 2026. Kaya if we could look into kung magkano po ang kailangan nila para ipakita natin na Congress is supportive of this investigation and supportive of the efforts of our President and the Ombudsman,” he said.

Committee chairperson Mikaela Suansing requested additional data from the OMB.

“You will play such a huge role in making the panel successful and I know that will entail additional work, additional responsibilities on the part of the OMB,” she said.

“We want to make sure that we're able to factor that in. May panahon pa naman po na mapasok natin ‘yan sa proposal natin for fiscal year 2026. Again, we would need the help of the OMB to help please guide us para malaman natin ano ‘yung mga kailangan natin idagdag,” she added.

Following this, the House Committee terminated the budget.

“The motion has been duly seconded and, with that, motion is carried. The budget hearing on the proposed budget of the OMB for fiscal year 2026 is terminated,” she said. — BAP, GMA Integrated News