Review and reallocate DPWH’s budget

This refers to the Inquirer article: “DPWH to fast-track rollout of projects after lockdown” (4/18/20).

One of the best things that happened during this community quarantine is not having any road reblocking done by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH). Whenever I saw one before, it revolted me knowing precious money was being wasted.

The government has allocated a P1.17-trillion budget for our COVID-19 response. Of this, P568 billion has been raised. The P275 billion budget for the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act is already included in this new budget. The government is planning to borrow P288 billion from the Asian Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank for the gap that remains.

But instead of borrowing further, why don’t we review the DPWH’s P581-billion budget? There are a lot of spurious projects lined up under that department. Our state auditors can check for unnecessary road reblocking projects, unnecessary cementing of road shoulder, unnecessary planter box construction, unnecessary culvert laying, unnecessary cementing of riverbanks, unnecessary bridge repair, etc. There are many other such unnecessary things.

The DPWH has even come up with fancy names for the above: road improvement (road reblocking), antiflood measure (for culvert), road widening (cementing of shoulder), etc. If indeed found spurious, the allocations for such projects should be realigned to more urgent and necessary undertakings that could help boost the government’s response to the pandemic.

CHESTER C. CHANG
ches_chang@yahoo.com