The House of Representatives will have to pass a supplemental budget to accommodate the requests of some congressmen whose budget allocations for their respective districts were slashed in this year’s national government budget, a House official said Tuesday.
Davao City Rep. Isidro Ungab, chairman of the House committee on appropriations, said passing a supplemental budget was among the options his panel would consider to address the lawmakers’ increased budgetary allocations for 2020.
“This is just one of the possible options, Ungab said. ‘‘We will study how we’ll be able to resolve the concerns.
Ungab said it would be difficult to restore the budget cuts under the proposed P4.1-trillion General Appropriations Bill for 2020.
READ: P4.1-trillion budget bill withdrawn
“I appealed to them, I talked to those who came to me and raised their concerns to please not to include [their budget hike requests] in the 2020 budget bill,” Ungab said.
He confirmed the claim of deputy speaker for finance and Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte that some 68 congressmen were “unhappy” with their congressional allocations, so they would want amendments to the General Appropriations Bill.
Ungab earlier accused Villafuerte of trying to tamper with the proposed 2020 national government budget for 2020 to introduce ‘‘insertions.’’
Ungab said any changes being done to the GAB that was basically a copy of the National Expenditure Program submitted by Malacañng was an ‘‘insertion.’’
Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano said the House leadership was able to sort out the procedural issues that caused the friction between Ungab and Villafuerte in a meeting that he presided on Tuesday afternoon.
Cayetano said he requested all departments and agencies to submit the written presentations of their respective budget proposals before 5 p.m. on Monday.
Cayetano said the House leadership was still committed to approve the 2020 budget before Congress goes on recess on the first week of October.
READ: Congress to pass proposed national budget for 2020
READ: Two lawmakers feud over budget insertion bid