SENATOR Imee Marcos revealed that this year’s national budget defunded billions of pesos in pensions for retired military and uniformed personnel, as well as retirement and separation benefits for government workers while giving way to the controversial Ayuda para sa Kapos ang Kita Program (AKAP).
A comparison between the National Expenditure Program (NEP) submitted to Congress and the General Appropriations Act for 2024 shows that the Pension and Gratuity Fund suffered a Php110.25-billion cut, from Php253,205,826,000 to Php142,956,826,000.
The senator also lamented the Php5.4-billion cut in the Php15.31-billion budget proposed in the NEP for the Department of Migrant Workers and the complete deletion of programmed funding for foreign-assisted flagship projects of the Department of Public Works and Highways.
Marcos, who chairs the Senate Committee on Social Justice, Welfare, and Rural Development, reiterated that the Php26.7-billion AKAP, which also has more than Php33 billion in unprogrammed funds, was a Lower House insertion in the 2024 budget’s final version, to which the e-signatures of senators were attached after the fact.
“The President did not mention AKAP in the NEP, nor was it in the bicameral version of the GAA, yet it appeared in the final, printed version,” Marcos explained.
“Labu-labong 60 billion ang inilaan. Di natin alam kung para sa bigas, o sa trabaho, o sa outright ayuda,” she said, citing the DSWD’s admission that it still had to draw up the program’s guidelines for implementation.
(A fuzzy 60 billion was allotted. We don’t know if it’s for rice, jobs, or outright cash assistance.)
The senator is consulting with the DBM and DSWD ahead of a possible Senate investigation of AKAP, apart from the ongoing probe by the Senate electoral reforms committee to verify the authenticity of a so-called People’s Initiative to revise the Constitution.
“Hindi ko kinokontra ang AKAP kundi ang tiwaling paggamit nito para sa pulitika. Alam naman natin ang national budget ngayong taon ay election budget,” Marcos said, referring to the national and local elections in 2025.
