The Caucus of Development NGO Networks (CODE-NGO) supports the measures of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) and Congress to promote the proper and efficient use of the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF). These include requiring that the legislators specify the scope of work and type of equipment, the number of units to be built for housing projects, the type of vehicle and the number of units to be purchased, the number of scholars and health beneficiaries and the names of schools and hospitals for education and health projects.
In response to the new “stringent requirements” of the DBM before releasing the PDAF of legislators, several congresspersons have opined that these represent a surrender of the Congress’ power of the purse to the executive branch and that this new policy reflects undemocratic processes. We cannot agree with this. In fact, we laud the efforts of DBM in continuing on the “straight path” towards the transparent and responsible use of PDAF.
It has long been an objective of the civil society led monitoring effort called PDAF Watch, spearheaded by CODE-NGO, to ensure the responsible and transparent use of the PDAF of Congresspersons and Senators. CODE-NGO’s recommendations to the legislators even goes beyond new DBM policy – for example, we recommend requiring that all PDAF projects be part of the approved comprehensive development plan (CDP) and annual investment plan (AIP) of the concerned barangay/ municipality/ city/ province or endorsed by the concerned local development council (LDC) to ensure that the projects are coordinated with the other projects in the locality.
Greater transparency about the PDAF projects would help reduce corruption and improve their responsiveness and effectiveness. In the latest PDAF Watch report (for 2009-2010), we noted that only 9% of the Senators and 3% of the Congresspersons replied to our requests for information on their PDAF. The Senate does not include in its website a report on the senators’ PDAF projects. The House of Representatives (HoR) started doing this in 2007, after the first PDAF Watch report. However, a closer look at the HoR website shows that out of the 269 Representatives, only 109 or 41% submitted their project highlights for 2007 and this went down to only 37 (14%) for 2008.
In 2011, DBM also took a major step in making the information on PDAF available to the public through the electronic Transparency and Accountability Initiative for Lump Sum Funds (e-TAILS) section on its website.
We urge the DBM and Congress to continue on their effort to reform the PDAF to make this more transparent, accountable, responsive and effective in truly promotion “priority development”. -0-