So, yesterday and the day before that, my young friends on Facebook were all agog over Senator Panfilo “Ping” Lacson’s supposedly explosive revelation on House Representatives from Pampanga and Camarines Sur carving out a P2 billion or P3 billion chunk of the 2019 national budget as their “pork barrel fund”.
Lacson announced his oncoming expose in the way some gay showbiz commentators would entice people to listen their most recently concocted rumors.
Not that Lacson suddenly launched into a flaming, flamboyant pirouette during a press conference or a session at the Senate Plenary. But he certainly piled on copious amounts of insinuations and intrigue on what amounts to a procedural lapse in the passage of the 2019 General Appropriations Act.
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Thing is, although Lacson fashions himself to be the scourge of pork barrel allocations, he seemed to struggle during his exposition and, at least to me, failed to show that there was anything illegal or unethical. Then again, maybe his point during the plenary interpellation with Senator Loren Legarda was so subtle and esoteric that it had escaped me.
Honestly, all I got out of it was that he was allusion to members of the House of Representatives as having inserted P2 billion to P3 billion worth of projects for their districts.
I really don’t know whether budget insertions can be classified as a corrupt act or deemed unconstitutional, but I don’t think there is something wrong with a congressman or congresswoman seeking to fund more projects in their district to benefit their constituents.
Although we all know that congressmen are meant to legislate and keep the executive branch in check, their constituents expect them to bring projects and provide various types of aide as if they were governors or mayors.
This is a reality that Lacson fails to recognize, as senators like himself, do not have a constituency or people in a district to be accountable to.
I had expected Lacson to come up with specific examples of budget insertions that common people such as myself would immediately recognize as obviously corrupt.
But what I have seen so far was a far, far cry from the Lacson exposes that shook the country.
Neither did Lacson dare to name the district representatives or congressmen/women who he accuses of inserting pork barrel items in the budget.
Alluding to people instead of directly naming them looks unbecoming of a man of his age and stature. Besides, making parinig is dated Mean Girls tactic.
Powerf puff gals…
Anyway, by saying those who inserted items in the budget were district representatives from Pampanga and Camarines Sur, some took it to mean that he was referring to House Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and Congressman Rolando Andaya.
Of course, I can understand the political grudge that Lacson may still have against Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, but what would he have against House Majority Leader Rolando Andaya?
Hmmmmm…. I wonder.
Could the Villafuertes have something to do with Lacson’s supot (fizzled out) expose?
Unlike Lacson and his buddies in the picture above, Andaya faced the insinuations head on and answered the issues squarely.
The House majority leader denied having billions of pesos in insertions in the 2019 national budget and likewise denied involvement in amending the budget submitted by the Department of Budget and Management.
Andaya pointed out that he instructed the House Appropriations Committee not to tamper with any amendments and if ever it should be done, it should be with the consultation of the Senate at the bicameral level.
As for the flood control projects in Pampanga, if I am not mistaken, Lacson questioned the need to keep on spending for flood control and I just had to laugh at how clueless he is about the situation in Pampanga as well as Bulacan.
Andaya clarified that the budget item Lacson was questioning and attributing erroneously as benefitting ONLY House Speaker Arroyo’s district, is actually intended to benefit the entire province of Pampanga as well as Bulacan.
Moreover, according to Andaya, House Speaker Arroyo’s district ranks 100th place as far as the amount of allocations are concerned.
“Diretsuhin na po natin, I think the persons being referred to are the Speaker and myself na lumalabas na napakalaki ng allocation na binigay sa distrito. Just to clarify ang allocation ng ating Speaker, she’s actually ranked 100. Around 99 congressmen ang mas malaki po ang allocation sa kanilang distrito.”
Andaya’s district, on the other hand, is in the 186th place.
He noted that one congressman was allocated P8 billion and that several senators had allotments bigger than P8 Billion.
Regarding the alleged P 16 Billion given to local government units without consulting the DBM, Andaya clarified that at this point when the budget is already in Congress, the DBM need not be consulted since it is only Congress that has the power to determine if the allocations are in accordance with the guidelines set by the DBM.
In anycase, as far as anomalous items in the budget are concerned, Andaya vowed to help the senate uncover anomalous items in the proposed national budget.
In ending, this short blog post, I’d like to remind everyone that for all the thunder and lightning Lacson unleashed as a self proclaimed anti-corruption warrior during the Napoles pork barrel scam investigations in the senate, he failed to get former DBM Secretary Butch Abad to answer for masterminding the PDAF scam.
To which, all I can say is: “There’s another word that rhymes with PDAF and it starts with the letter B.”
Writer.
I believe that Pork Barrels should be abolished. It is the source of corruption in Congress. Projects are not finished, overpriced, and some are ghost projects. The people in power use pork barrel, as “carrot and stick” to manipulate congressmen to do their will.
Some people like Porky Drilon, are like swines who gorge up a lot of pork barrel money for such a small project. We don’t know how much money did : Aquino, Abad, Mar Roxas, Lugaw Robredo, Rudy Farinas and the rest of the Aquino gang allocated to their pockets !
I don’t know if I should trust Sen. Ping Lacson or not but it looks like he’s one of another attack dogs by the Liberal Party just like Sen. Trililing & putting the blame to President Duterte for resurrecting the Pork Barrel under his administration.
And what he did to Tacloban, Leyte when he was an advisor or tsar on a position for a post-Yolanda rehab? I don’t think he’d done for a good job there and there are some housing projects that are still unfinished & even overpriced & the construction was substandard! Even worst, there’s was a news about 2 months ago that an undistributed donation goods coming from the foreign countries that was found in a Cebu City Port & its been there for the past 4 years! And that should been given to the victims of Super Typhoon Yolanda but the Bureau of Customs at the time of President Abnoy was declared a smuggled goods! That’s a huge BS, and why the past administration didn’t allowed it in the 1st place in spite that it was really a donation for the victims of the most powerful & deadliest typhoon ever hit in our country? Wala ba talagang puso si President Abnoy noong panahon na yon?!? His persona had finally exposed, a wolf in a sheep’s clothing.
They want the pilipinos to suffer so they will hate marcos.
Filipinos are experts at creating their own suffering. They don’t really need any assistance there.
The politicians just steal all their stuff. This makes Filipinos happy, because it makes them look like victims. That’s why they keep voting for the same thieves, over and over again.
Liberals believe and inexhaustible fund exists that can be tapped endlessly to pay for government social programs. Tax the rich and give it to a long line of moochers, pork barrel hustlers and ne’er-do-wells. These funds would otherwise have been employed as additional capital indispensable to economic progress.
Paul Farol,
You are an idiot! So you want to perpetuate the inclination of corruption again? You are fucked! This is plain stupidity if you allow congressmen/women and senators to have the discretion of identifying projects and funding supposed to be the job of the implementing agencies like the DPWH and DSWD under the executive branch of government since it is in the constitution that the job of legislatures are only to enact, repeal and amend the laws and oversee various committees while the executive branch is to execute the laws and projects of government. The Supreme Court of the Philippines already ruled unconstitutional all kinds of pork barrel funds under the General Fund that both members of the houses are getting. And yet now it is blatantly resurrected again under the speakership of the veteran wheelchair drama queen Gloria Arroyo and it is okay with you? Paul Farol, honestly, are you one of those people who are getting and who will get kickbacks from pork that is why you disagree with Lacson? Because it is okay with you to continue the old system rule that is already proven and tested to be vulnerable in corruption and abuse.
Andaya and Arroyo are really mastermind of manipulating things in favor of their own and their kind in the house of representatives as based on their experience. So these congressmen and senators have billions worth of projects for their constituents again? I wonder how much money will be siphoned to corrupt politicians and persons like Napoles again in the future. They intentionally delay the passage of this national budget bill this year to have some insertions. Another scheme of milking the public funds and Paul Farol is so okay with that. And what about the crusade of anti-corruption campaign by Duterte as he promised to the Filipinos? Seems like it is one of his another lame jokes again. Where is “change is coming”? Old system rules! Oh yeah! The Filipino people are already used to it anyway. Poor Philippines.
Only screaming dyed in the wool yellows are not idiots.
Another closet Yellowtardism rant right there. Nothing new.
BTW, are you one of the guys who constantly keep on saying “alleged means true”? Or it’s just another biased media nonsense coming from your mouth?
Poor LP Citizen, wasting his time shitposting then gains nothing.
Hate to break it to you, but Lacson’s “expose” is thoroughly moronic.
And there’s this guy named Philip Lustre posted a signed letter supposedly from Speaker Arroyo yet when you look at it, the signature was fake. And you love to overrate this issue while failing to realize that former Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez’s budget ranges over 8 BILLION while GMA has 2.4B. C’mon she’s the Speaker! What do you expect the Speaker’s budget to be? Pang piso-fare? Furthermore, 99 other congressmen have bigger budgets than the Speaker herself! How can this important fact not have found its way to the news or Lacson’s moronic “expose?”
Also, it’s the departments that submit their recommendations fro whatever projects or programs that need funding in whatever district, so that proposal never came from GMA but the from the executive. And what do you expect from Pampanga, it can’t have a decent slice of the budget pie when, as a province, it has important economic hubs and a major airport?
You have to do better than that. For instance, this is just another senseless hate and vitriol.
Decade10,
Hate to break it to you but you still want to perpetuate corruption in the government particulary in the Congress. Supreme Court ruled all kinds of pork barrel must be abolished. And we had experienced abuse of funds already by Senators and Napoles and you did not learn anything.
The executive is the one who is responsible for budgeting and project implementation. Sure lawmakers can recommend but they don’t have to be the the final decision maker of the budgeting and implementation which is a kind of encroaching. Unfortunately to the executive department also, seems it did not exercise right balancing because it promotes cronysim while other districts are left behind in the development. Pampanga is not just the only province that needs attention. How about other big provinces where cronic poverties are still rampant compared to Pampanga? That should be the focus of the executive, not the already progressive ones.
And hate to break it to you yet you missed the fact that abuse of funds during that time is also committed by Noynoy Aquino but never went into fruition. That’s why he’s mad when the Supreme Court ruled about the abolishment of the pork barrel yet there are replacements like DAP and PDAF, which is an invention of former Budget Secretary Fortunato Abad. So what are you trying to point out?
Decade10,
You are so stupid for including the past admin and being emo over them when we are already dealing with the present admin who is already sitting for more than 2 years and who promises “change is coming” and “corruption has no place in my government”
You condemned Aquino admin as corrupt and yet you cannot condemn that Duterte admin now appears to be corrupt so where is the change is coming there? And where is the logic there when you hate corruption and yet when it is about your politician, corruption is okay with you? You are selfish and serving your own personal corrupt interest and not the best interest of the country. I thought you brag that you are different than your enemy liberal party you are accusing of as being corrupt and evil but it turned out you are also the same. Your brain is fucked up! Get lost!
@LP Citizen:
Can you tell me when did becoming unbiased and unprejudiced means being stupid? I’m just being realistic about the past admin while you just love to blatantly ignore it. That’s what you get if you don’t use your brains correctly and accept every spin the media tells you.
In case you don’t notice, you actually condemn Duterte and his admin for being ‘corrupt’ because that is what the biased mainstream media says to you, along with your nonsensical hatred and emotionally-charged vitriol. I condemn the past Aquino admin for being corrupt while using my own critical thinking and no MSM (mainstream media) bullshit in my system. Lemme guess: corruption is fine for you if it’s not a politician you hate or any tainted surname. LP Citizen is also selfish and serving his own personal corrupt interest, and keeps on saying the Liberal Party is always on the best interest of the country while in reality, they only care about gaining political power once again. And yes, I’m always different unlike you who is easily manipulated on whom to hate and whom to love by just a simple whim due to your overreliance on MSM.
Oh yeah, your brain is already fucked up in the first place. As if you fully owned this website. So you should be the one who should get lost because all you want is gaining attention and nothing else. We had it enough of your antics.
Decade10 the faggot,
I stick to my point that your are stupid because you are doing exactly the reason why you hate the Noynoy government and the Liberal party. So no different on your part.
Noynoy Aquino’s government had passed already. Look at the issues of today in Duterte’s government who promise to be different but still the same kind of breed with the traditional politicians. The corruption, political vengeance, and croniysm are still rampant. The getreal and you are hating Noynoy before because of those issues but you cannot hate Duterte now with the same issues of that of Noynoy? How stupid are you! As I said your brain is fucked up and destroyed by your loyalty to your politicians just like the authors of this website who lost their standards when Duterte came to power.