PhilHealth now given P53B; zero for Akap
It’s a reversal of fortunes for the state-run insurer and a congressional cash aid program as the executive branch seeks to restore funding to critical agencies and cut back on less urgent initiatives in next year’s proposed P6.793 trillion national budget.
The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth), which had zero subsidy from the government last year, will receive P53.3 billion for its National Health Insurance Program under the 2026 National Expenditure Program (NEP).
Congress’ pet cash aid Ayuda Para Sa Kapos ang Kita Program (AKAP), on the other hand, will get zero funding next year.
Leftover funds
Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman, who presided over the turnover of the 2026 NEP to the House of Representatives on Wednesday, said the restoration of the government subsidies for PhilHealth would cover insurance premiums of indirect contributors, as well as funding for medical assistance to indigent and financially incapacitated patients.
As for AKAP, she explained, there were still leftover funds for the program from 2025 when it received a P26 billion budget.
“Given the limited fiscal space, we have decided not to include it this year,” Pangandaman said.
Nueva Ecija Rep. Mikaela Suansing, chair of the House committee on appropriations, said that while the House still saw the value of the program, she would have to defer to her House colleagues on whether they would move to reinstate its budget for 2026.
“We’ve been seeing how it’s been helpful to many of our constituencies. It’s helped so many people, especially those previously untapped or not reached by our 4Ps program,” she said, referring to the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program.
“We will see how the discussions will go,” she said, adding that this was “the first time” she’s seen the NEP and the zero funding for AKAP.
Last-minute insertion
Constitutional law expert and lawyer Michael Henry Yusingco said next year’s budget appears to be “more responsive to the urgent needs of the country compared to the 2025 budget, but our major concern is how Congress will proceed with [its] enactment.”
AKAP, a social welfare program that provides a one-time cash assistance to minimum wage earners and near-poor Filipinos, was also not part of the 2025 NEP but was suddenly inserted in the bicameral conference committee version with a P26-billion budget.
While many believe this came at the expense of PhilHealth’s budget, the Marcos administration has defended the move by stating that the state-run insurer has ample reserve funds to cover its operations and health insurance coverage.
Now, Yusingco said, the onus is up to Congress to “fulfill its promise” of making the budgetary process more transparent by opening up the deliberations to the public, “otherwise the enacted budget will be seen as anomalous as the 2025 budget.”
President Marcos has earlier warned Congress that he would not sign any national budget bill that was not aligned.
Rubber stamp
Yusingco, however, maintained that lawmakers should resist being a mere rubber stamp of the NEP and “this is precisely the reason why the engagement of civil society in the entire process is crucial. Let the public have their say while the budget is being deliberated.”
“On the other hand, if civil society is excluded from the process, then the rubber-stamping criticism will be hard to dispute,” he added.
The President’s son, Ilocos Norte Rep. Sandro Marcos, doubled down on his father’s threat as the lower chamber prepares for the budget deliberation starting next week.
“I will not allow a budget on the floor to pass that is a mutation of the NEP or that has become too far off from the NEP,” he told reporters after the turnover ceremony. “As majority leader, I won’t allow that.”
He maintained, however, that this was not tantamount to the President encroaching on Congress’ power of the purse: “If there is a tendency in which it’s taken too far, which the President thinks happened last year, that was his logic and that’s what he was alluding to when he said he wasn’t scared to reenact the budget.”
“I think the president thinks that it was really too much last year,” he added.
