CODE-NGO to Senators: PORK BARREL MUST BE ACCOUNTED FOR!
An on-going study of the PDAF Watch initiative of CODE-NGO, shows that around half of the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) of the senators which were released in 2010 and 2011 went to projects related to what are called soft projects and the other half went to infrastructure or hard projects. Of the P3.2 Billion of PDAF of the senators which was released in those 2 years, 48% went to hard projects and 52% went to soft projects. This is based on data posted on the website of the Department of Budget and Management. Each senator is allocated P 200 Million in PDAF per year or a total of P 4.8 Billion per year for 24 senators.
Soft projects include financial assistance to local governments units for livelihood assistance and social services such as medical assistance. Such soft projects have been identified in recent news reports as the types of projects allegedly used by Janet Lim-Napoles and her fake NGOs in their reported P 10 Billion scam over 10 years.
CODE-NGO reiterated its support for the NBI investigation into the alleged scam and its call to the Department of Budget and Management and the Commission on Audit to review and revise their policies and procedures for PDAF in general and for government funding assistance to NGOs and people’s organizations in particular. These policies should emphasize transparency and a thorough validation of the documents and reports submitted by government agencies and NGOs and POs, CODE-NGO said.
A PDAF Watch study in 2011 showed that only 9% of the 23 senators and 3% of the 269 congress persons in 2009-2010 replied and provided information on their PDAF. This was after letters and follow-up calls requesting for information on their PDAF were made by CODE-NGO over a period of several months.
“Most Filipinos are in the dark when it comes to the PDAF of lawmakers,” said Sixto Donato C. Macasaet, Executive Director of CODE-NGO. “Senators and congresspersons must provide reports on their PDAF projects to their constituents, including how they select projects and beneficiaries.” CODE-NGO has recommended that district representatives should submit annual reports to the municipal or provincial development councils, and all accredited POs and NGOs, and for party list representatives and senators to submit an annual report to all regional and provincial development councils, including the private sector representatives.
Recent reports that supposed beneficiaries of the PDAF and the Malampaya fund were not aware that they were listed as beneficiaries and their signatures in receipts were forged indicate that the flow of information is blocked and thus corruption is made easy. “To shed light on the pork barrel scam, the legislators and the agencies involved should disclose information on their PDAF projects, even in the absence of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Law,” stated Macasaet. “The Administration and Congress itself should also prioritize the FOI Bill to help prevent corruption cases like this”, he added.