Senate warns Palace of public ire if budget is not passed – Malaya 11.23.06
SENATE finance committee chair Franklin Drilon yesterday warned Malacañang that it would suffer "public indignation" in the 2007 elections if the proposed P1.126 trillion General Appropriations Act encounters any delay in its approval and government is forced to operate anew on a reenacted budget.
Drilon, irked by administration officials’ failure to show up at yesterday’s budget hearing, said it showed a "lack of courtesy" to a co-equal branch of government which "had been working on the budget for the last three months."
Malacañang officials apologized, blaming "lack of coordination" among those required at the Senate hearing. Finance Secretary Margarito Teves said he did not know that his presence was still needed during the plenary debates, Budget Secretary Rolando Andaya was in Palawan, and Economic Planning Secretary Romulo Neri was at the National Census Board meeting.
"We thought that one of us would be here in the Senate," Neri said. "It’s just lack of coordination," Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas deputy governor Diwa Gunigundo seconded, while Teves maintained their absence was not intentional.
Drilon sponsored the budget measure on Tuesday, recommending its approval but realigning billions of funds to augment the budget of the departments of Education, Health and Agriculture.
Ways and means committee chair Ralph Recto said he is also recommending that the overestimate of at least P4.4 billion in the outlay for debt service be used for the government’s health programs.
Recto said the higher amount resulted from the computation used, which was P53 to a dollar when the peso was actually trading at 49.99. He said adopting a lower P51:$1 exchange rate would lower interest payments on foreign liabilities to P112.6 billion.
Recto said economic managers deliberately adopt a "conservative, unrealistic" foreign exchange rate in drawing up interest payments "so how to spend the ensuing savings becomes the sole prerogative of the executive branch."
"Better for Congress to determine where the excess interest payments should go now than leave that task to the executive branch, which the Constitution does not empower it to do," he said. – JP Lopez and Dennis Gadil
Drilon, irked by administration officials’ failure to show up at yesterday’s budget hearing, said it showed a "lack of courtesy" to a co-equal branch of government which "had been working on the budget for the last three months."
Malacañang officials apologized, blaming "lack of coordination" among those required at the Senate hearing. Finance Secretary Margarito Teves said he did not know that his presence was still needed during the plenary debates, Budget Secretary Rolando Andaya was in Palawan, and Economic Planning Secretary Romulo Neri was at the National Census Board meeting.
"We thought that one of us would be here in the Senate," Neri said. "It’s just lack of coordination," Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas deputy governor Diwa Gunigundo seconded, while Teves maintained their absence was not intentional.
Drilon sponsored the budget measure on Tuesday, recommending its approval but realigning billions of funds to augment the budget of the departments of Education, Health and Agriculture.
Ways and means committee chair Ralph Recto said he is also recommending that the overestimate of at least P4.4 billion in the outlay for debt service be used for the government’s health programs.
Recto said the higher amount resulted from the computation used, which was P53 to a dollar when the peso was actually trading at 49.99. He said adopting a lower P51:$1 exchange rate would lower interest payments on foreign liabilities to P112.6 billion.
Recto said economic managers deliberately adopt a "conservative, unrealistic" foreign exchange rate in drawing up interest payments "so how to spend the ensuing savings becomes the sole prerogative of the executive branch."
"Better for Congress to determine where the excess interest payments should go now than leave that task to the executive branch, which the Constitution does not empower it to do," he said. – JP Lopez and Dennis Gadil
posted by brodkaster43 at Huwebes, Nobyembre 23, 2006
0 Comments:
Mag-post ng isang Komento
<< Home