Budget battles

President Marcos’ “Mahiya naman kayo” State of the Nation Address message to Congress gave momentum to public protests over the plunder of the national budget enabled by collusion among businessmen, bureaucrats, and high-ranking politicians. But in the P7.2-trillion National Expenditure Program (NEP), the People’s Budget Coalition (PBC) and BetterGov.PH identified unexplained insertions similar to those seen from 2023 to 2026. Some 7,000 projects costing about P190 billion appeared in the amended budget but not in the NEP or agency submissions. These red flags threatened a repeat of earlier budget disasters.

PBC’s continuing study of the 2027 NEP, echoed by alarmed civil society, business, and church leaders, has prompted the Supreme Court to join the fray. A two-way constitutional battle between the executive/judicial and legislative branches appeared to be brewing. But a surprising Supreme Court intervention has opened a gap between the executive and judicial branches. At Malacañang’s instruction, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) raised with the Supreme Court the risk of “judicial overreach” encroaching on congressional and presidential powers. It requested clarification on the Supreme Court’s disallowance of nearly P500 billion in the 2004-2006 General Appropriations Acts. Still a two-way battle, but with fluid, shifting alliances.

Ideally, as the OSG argued, each government branch should establish guardrails to protect its budget process and correct exposed weaknesses through its own constitutional powers. But the OSG challenge has cast doubt on the President’s resolve to end corruption in his own budget program. A House budget that gave the biggest insertion, P4.37 billion, to the Ilocos Norte district represented by Ferdinand Alexander “Sandro” Marcos, deputy Speaker, and the President’s son, reinforced these doubts. The second and third biggest insertions went to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) districts covering the constituencies of Speaker Faustino Dy III in Isabela and appropriations committee chair Mikaela Suansing in Nueva Ecija. These insertions sent the message that the most powerful get the largest share of the spoils.

As the executive and House interests appeared increasingly aligned, a breach surfaced between the House and Senate in their responses to the 2027 budget issues flagged by PBC: items lacking supporting documentation; wrong project locations (Celebes Sea instead of Cebu); dubious, uniform engineering project costings; and questionable priorities. Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian and finance committee chair Sen. JV Ejercito welcomed the assistance offered by PBC and its 5,000 volunteers in analyzing the 2027 House and NEP budgets. Senators Risa Hontiveros and Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan invited PBC leaders to their committee budget hearings.

The House budget amendment reform subcommittee (BARSc) also appeared receptive to a PBC partnership. It invited PBC to a meeting supposed to be live streamed. The live stream was delayed by four hours, during which BARSc held closed-door deliberations without civil society or media representation. When finally allowed in, PBC representatives had three minutes to speak. Rep. Ronnie Puno, deputy House Speaker and national chair of the National Unity Party, later dismissed PBC’s issues as arising from critics’ ignorance. Only 13 of over 300 House members declined to sign the House budget.

Some had hoped public outrage over the trillion-peso DPWH/budget plunder had sufficiently shamed those in institutions implicated in the crime. We are still learning the depth of the rot in our systems and the difficulty of cleansing it. Former DPWH Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo testified at the Sandiganbayan that kickbacks and commission arrangements, rising from 10 percent to 30 percent, were routine in all government infrastructure projects. He claimed no politician he knows has ever rejected them, except Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson.

The budget battleground has shifted from the House to the Senate. With civil society’s help and public support, the Senate can still achieve the immediate goal: clean up the 2027 budget. Gatchalian and Ejercito have pledged to expose shameless legislators, but the battle has also shifted. Lacson has acknowledged that some people “truly have no sense of shame left.”

More crucial than shaming politicians is empowering institutions and voters by sharing information about: 1) their right to demand an explanation of who benefits from the taxes they pay; 2) the data they need to check politicians’ answers; and 3) the tools they can use to correct or add to available data.

The PBC, led by the “Angry Nerds,” has made a spectacular contribution to this goal. Their anger has been contagious and focused. Their work will help voters decide which politicians to support in 2028.