Duterte signs P3.757-T nat’l budget; vetoes P95.3B of House items

President Rodrigo Duterte has signed the P3.757-trillion national budget but vetoed  provisions on P95.3 billion worth of programs and projects introduced by the House of Representatives after both chambers ratified the version approved by the bicameral committee, Senate President Vicente Sotto III said on Monday.

In a text message from Bangkok, Sotto said Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea informed him of Duterte's signing of the General Appropriations Act for 2019, or Republic Act No. 11260.

Sought for confirmation, Medialdea confirmed that Duterte signed the national budget on Monday. Sotto said no ceremonial signing had been scheduled.

P95.3 billion vetoed

Medialdea told GMA News Online that the President vetoed P95.3-billion in appropriations for the Department of Public Works and Highways. He said the items were vetoed “for being not part of the President’s priority projects.”

Sotto earlier identified the list of P95.3 billion worth of programs and projects that the Senate wanted removed from the proposed appropriations, including the P75 billion funded from realignments and placed under the Local Infrastructure Program of the Department of Public Works and Highways.

He said the realigned cuts came from:

• asset preservation program, network development program, and bridge program
• flood management program and convergence and support program

“The President may wish to consider disapproving these unconstitutional realignments, pursuant to his constitutional power to veto particular items in the General Appropriations Bill,” Sotto had said.

Andaya pitch

The Senate and the House of Representatives have engaged in a tussle over the P75 billion amount, which House appropriations chairman Rolando Andaya Jr. said was not a realignment but mere itemization of lump sum funds.

In a last-ditch move to make the House proposal acceptable to Malacanang, Andaya announced last week the inclusion of a fourth book in the 2019 General Appropriations Bill.

"This is the first time that the General Appropriations Act, once signed into law by the President, is made up of four volumes of budget books," he said.

Andaya said the House leadership has moved for the itemization of the budget for specific programs and projects in compliance with the latest Supreme Court's decision on the pork barrel issue.

"Once the President signs the 2019 General Appropriations Act, the fourth budget book with itemized allocation for programs and projects will be out in the open," he said," Andaya said.

Reenacted budget ends

Duterte’s signing of the law put an end to the government’s four-month reliance on a reenacted spending plan that has affected the implementation of several programs and projects for this year.

Last Thursday, the President threatened to veto the entire budget measure if he found irregularities in it.

Duterte’s spokesperson Salvador Panelo explained the following day that the Office of the President was “exercising utmost care in the review and evaluation” of the budget bill.

“As a lawyer and strict enforcer of the rule of law, the President treads cautiously in performing his constitutional duty making sure that before he inks his signature to the document, the latter does not violate our Constitution, as well as related jurisprudence on the matter,” he said.

The government had been operating on a reenacted budget since January after the Congress failed to pass the 2019 General Appropriations Act before 2018 ended as  lawmakers wrangled over alleged anomalous insertions in the spending bill.  —Virgil Lopez/NB/LDF, GMA News