The full implementation of the administration’s big-ticket infrastructure projects under its Build, Build, Build program will start once President Rodrigo Duterte signs the P4.1-trillion national government budget law, a senior lawmaker said on Saturday.
House Deputy Speaker for Finance Luis Raymund Villafuerte said the President’s approval of this year’s budget “will propel the economy to a higher trajectory.”
Villafuerte said the 2020 budget will enable the administration to accelerate state spending on infrastructure and human capital development, which, in turn, will boost the growth momentum and create more jobs.
While this year’s budget is still awaiting the President’s signature, Villafuerte said the newly-signed Republic Act No. 11464 that made unspent portions of the 2019 budget available for release until Dec. 31, 2020 will ensure the unhindered implementation of infrastructure and employment projects.
“The swift approval of both measures by the House under the leadership of Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano and House Majority Leader and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez best illustrates the unequivocal support of the bigger chamber for the vision of President Duterte to sustain the high-growth momentum, attack poverty and improve the lives of the Filipino people over the medium term,” Villafuerte said.
“Both the 2020 GAB [General Appropriations Bill], which the President is due to sign [Monday], and RA No. 11464 would enable the government to sustain the catch-up spending strategy that Mr. Duterte’s economic team put in place this year’s third quarter to make up for the four-months-and-a-half delay in the passage of the 2019 budget that hobbled economic growth in the first semester,” he added.
Duterte is scheduled to sign the budget bill into law on Monday at 4 p.m.
Acting Budget Secretary Wendel Avisado said the Department of Budget and Management and the Office of the President were already done with the budget review, but did not disclose whether certain items will be vetoed amid concerns over pork-like lump sum items.
“We defer to the President. He has the final say regardless of our recommendation and we cannot second guess him so it’s better to just wait,” he said.
Senator Panfilo Lacson earlier skipped the signing of the bicameral report on the money measure because of his concerns on the alleged last-minute insertions.
The senator claimed that there are still “lump sums” and “vaguely described” projects in the bicameral report.
The senator’s office reportedly received a USB flash drive containing a list of 1,253 budget items worth P83.219 billion that was allegedly used as the congressmen’s “source” of their “list” of 742 projects worth P16.345 billion that were inserted in the bicameral report.