By Adolfo Quizon Paglinawan

 

Part 1 of a Series: Is it worth saving an incompetent and corrupt President?

The first official act of President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos when he assumed office was sign Executive Order 1, which abolished the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission.

The PACC had received over 13,000 complaints, of which more than150 cases have been filed in court and hundreds more accorded administrative sanctions like terminations or suspensions of public officials.

Vlogger Zandra Flores comments, “In its place? The Deputy Executive Secretary for Legal Affairs (DESLA). An office not built for investigations—and since then? No reports. No data. No transparency.”

Why silence the watchdog? she quipped.

Today as unprecedented and unimaginable deluge of corruption has inundated the Marcos administration from its feet, the president is not only trying desperately to control the gargantuan damage he has dealt on the country’s public finance, and saving what remains of his rule that is still two years and a half down the road.

Art of deception

The vlogsite Heneral Lunacy cites some tips that Marcos’ new secretary of the Presidential Communications Office Dave Gomez – has applied from the crisis management playbook of companies when faced with a public relations disaster, be it “Abbotts’ recall of its tainted infant baby formula or Boeing’s 737 Max plane crashes”:

“One, show up and by this I do not mean the occasional, scripted press conferences that are more performative than they are productive. We currently have an invisible Government. Our high officials should leave their comfort zones, get down in the weeds and interact with the populace. We need visible leadership not press releases of full employment, strong growth and falling inflation that are meaningless to Filipinos. Most of our economic managers are good people but, understandably, are fearful of being publicly skewered; but as they say, if you cannot take the heat, then leave the kitchen and let somebody else do the cooking.

“Two, acknowledge the problems frontally and take responsibility for the failures be it in corruption, jobs, inflation, healthcare or education. Silence denotes fear, guilt, insensitivity, ignorance and/or incompetence. For example, admit that in the Philippines we have thousands of 10-year-olds who cannot read yet are being pushed up in grade because of the congestion in public class rooms. This explains why our 15-year-olds are second to last worldwide in comprehension, science and math. We are fostering a generation of illiterate children at a time when knowledge is the primary driver of progress.

“Three, learn and fix the problems in a transparent, accountable, sustained and timely manner. Government can try to talk its way out of its deficiencies but that no longer works. Do not treat Filipinos like 5-year-olds. So please no more Government by soothing messaging, just Government by action. The Administration could start with quick-acting, easy wins while it addresses longer term concerns. Throwing a bunch of crooks in jail could be such a quick and easy fix.”

These image engineering maneuvers seem to be working in the interregnum, as the once-president in isolation has been going out on sorties inspecting questioned project sites.

Meanwhile, wannabes Mayors Benjamin Magalong of Baguio and Vico Sotto of Pasig advise the public that information leading to the discovery of corrupt public officials and contractors involving flood control projects should be forwarded to the president. Senator Ping Lacson has been preempting Blue Ribbon Chairman Dante Marcoleta with results of his own investigations that, as a former national police chief, has been most likely culled by his countless snitches, while Senator Tito Sotto engages him in a Dolphy-Panchito repartee in the floor of the upper house.

The oligarchic media and Zamora’s troll farm are handsomely paid to catch this massaged wind of distraction, blowing towards the intended net impression  that the solution lies in President Marcos Jr, and that the people should stick with him as he resolves the issues.

But this panacea fleets after a while, because when push comes to shove, the eureka moment happens, the truth jumps out and the grim realization arrives that the problem is rooted in what the president has omitted to do and what he has recklessly committed.

The law rules

His worst witness is the Constitution of the Philippines.

The basic rule set for the use of government funds: “Art. VI, Sec. 29. No money shall be paid by the Treasury except in pursuance of an appropriation made by law.”

The qualifying phrase “in pursuance of an appropriation made by law”, must follow the necessary steps prescribed in the national budgeting process, where the President, as the head of the Executive Branch, has significant authority in the budgeting process, from initial proposals to it logical finality, following the broad strokes”

1. Agency Proposals:

Individual government agencies prepare and submit their budget proposals to the Department of Budget and Management (DBM). 2.

2. DBM Consolidation:

The DBM reviews these proposals and consolidates them into the President’s proposed budget called the National Expenditure Plan (NEP).

3. Congressional Approval:

The proposed budget is then submitted to Congress, which holds hearings and includes the specific appropriations in the proposed General Appropriations Bill (GAA). 

4. Presidential Signature:

The President signs the GAA, transforming it into law and making it effective. 

To summarize, the executive branch of government proposes the National Expenditure Program which is the consolidation of agency recommendations; Congress uses such as basis and legislates a General Appropriations Bill, which upon the President’s signature becomes a law known as the General Appropriations Act (GAA).

No funds can be allocated from the national budget without the Presidential signature on the GAA that serves as the legal authorization for spending government funds. Without this signature, the appropriations are not enacted into law. 

It is emphasized that all expenditures must be based on an appropriation law, making the President’s signature crucial for the enactment of these laws and the subsequent release of funds. No money can be paid from the treasury except in pursuance of an appropriation law or other specific statutory authority, and the President’s approval is integral to these statutes.

Pontius Pilate

Since the buck starts and stops with the President. Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr. cannot wash his hands and feign innocence pertaining to any anomaly involving the national budget. Marcos is responsible for how every member of his Cabinet spends his appropriated funds.

This is why I agree with the recent Congressional move to return the 2026 proposed budget to the Department of Budget Management, who serves as the “comptroller” of the government.

The DBM formulates and implements the national budget to align with national socio-economic objectives, oversees the sound and efficient use of government funds, and establishes a unified government compensation and position classification system.

Its core functions include preparing the national budget, developing accounting and budget management systems, releasing funds to government agencies, monitoring and evaluating government programs, and creating policies and standards for financial resource management.

Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian, who chairs the Senate Committee on Finance, flagged questionable entries in the proposed 2026 budget of the DPWH in the NEP during a committee hearing. Among the “red flags” Gatchalian cited were projects with no station numbers, identical amounts, phased allocations, rounded figures, coded names and even the reappearance of 2025-funded projects.

In the NEP submitted by the executive branch to Congress, the DPWH received a P880.008 billion proposed allocation for next year, of which P250.825 billion will again go to capital outlays for its flood management program.

What was scandalously alarming, however, was the confession of Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman that the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), has a “special” status in the budget preparation.

But for DPWH, “certain exemptions apply, Pangandaman told senators, “The DPWH has a special nature. It is stated in the budget call that DPWH is responsible since they have the expertise and the people to check. They are the ones who go on the ground with district engineers.”

Wow this is akin to assigning the fox and rodents to take care of the chicken coop!

Oh my god, this means that Pangandaman has defaulted DBM’s role to the DPWH, in contravention of an important step in validating DPWH entries – the effect of which by itself is a devastating violation of transparency and accountability that was precisely entrusted to DBM because the Commission on Audit no longer has pre-audit functions over government agencies.

How can the secretary of budget management miss this sample DPWH chart that Congressman Toby Tiangco submitted to the media, without suspecting any anomaly?

Besides the naked eye, the applicable math to detect anything abnormal in Tiangco’s chart, is so simple that a high school freshman can easily decipher:

The Bicam/Small Committee inserted 18,469,000 into the proposed NEP of 2,530.000  jacking up the total to this DPWH project to 20,999,000.

Rate of Increase    =         Absolute Increase x 100%

                                                Initial Value

                                    =         18,469,000 x 100%         =         88% x 100%

                                                2,530,000                                       12%

                                    =         1,846,900,000                   =         8800%

                                                2,530,000                                       12%

Final Answer          =         730%

Is the budget secretary telling us that if there appears to be a 730% increment, no shit has happened, no alarms are set off, no red flags whatsoever and that it is business as usual?     

Did she default on her own duties, or if not, under whose instruction did she do it? If such obnoxiously nauseating “special case” was made during Pangandaman’s watch, she must be fired for lack of circumspection and investigated for suspicion of criminal collaboration.

While it has become obvious that Tiangco’s mission all along has been to absolve the president of any liabilities in this scandal, to his credit however, there has been nobody else in the presidential defense, that has implicated, in fact mentioning the name of, Speaker Martin Romualdez, but Tiangco.

So who made the special case rule insofar as DPWH is concerned? Marcos or Romualdez or both?

Budget tracking

The national expenditure program, or the executive branch’s proposed budget, has been submitted to Congress to be scrutinized by both houses as the Senate and the House of Representatives are expected to craft the General Appropriations Bill for the following year.

From 2016 to 2025, Pangandaman did not notice anything suspicious?

Flood-control projects comparative insertions from 2011 to 2025.

So why should not Congress return the proposed NEP for 2026 to the Department of Budget Management when Pangandaman has again done a lousy job?

Even President Marcos said that even the 2026 consolidattion by DBM contained questionable allocations that need to be properly addressed: “The more we look, the more we find. There are several insertions. So, it really needs to be cleaned out properly,”

Sensing mediocrity in the DBM performance, Sen. Panfilo Lacson asked Pangandaman whether her office has the technology to track changes in the crafting of the national budget:

“Is there any current technology available to keep your system transparent yet secure, to enable us in both houses of Congress to track movements of the budget, from what is provided by the National Expenditure Program and going forward, to track who proposed which amendments to the General Appropriations Act?”

The senator said the Senate has set up a system to track changes in the budget, although he was not sure if the House of Representatives has one. The budget secretary said they have the capability to track changes from the NEP to the GAA, but may not be able to see the proponents of amendments unless they are provided minutes of the proceedings.

Looks promising, but I did not need any mechanical help, not even a calculator, when I glossed over Tianco’s chart. I also do not need to know who the proponents are, if already the figures indicate a red flag in the increase.

Lacson suggested that the DBM expand its digital budget management road map, which aims to replace the existing NEP generation tool.

Any techie will however tell you all computers are initially “idiot boxes” and that the machines are only as good as the humans that use them.

Our favorite saying while taking up information technology and data systems in Washington DC is, “you cannot squeeze blood out of turnips.”

It seems there are aplenty in Pangandaman’s lot.

She must be fired and replaced with no less than the qualifications of an Emily Boncodin.

To be continued:

Part 2: Revolving door cabinet recycles incompetence, corruption

   

Email: contact@asiancenturyph.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/asiancenturyph/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AsianCenturyPH

Substack:

Also read: