As news about the anomalous, if not altogether uncompassionate national budget began to spread, so did the protests begin.
There were press conferences by groups, which though sometimes disparate in beliefs, were united in anger. There were op-ed pieces by governance experts who saw the budget as a sign of graft and corruption to come. There were petitions from a variety of sectors that recognized the danger of cutting funding to education and health care while bloating the budget for road repairs and their ilk.
The education sector was one of the first to dissent. The Department of Education received a lower budget than the Department of Public Works and Highways, a direct contravention of the constitutional provision that dictates that the DepEd should have the highest budget allocation.
Some lawmakers reasoned that the previous DepEd secretary and her mishandling of funds were to blame. The department is apparently being made to shoulder the burden of one person’s ignominy, but truly, it’s the teachers and students who are being forced to pay for the budget cuts.
A side note: What a childish, vindictive response to cut the budget of an agency left in ruins by an inept leader that many politicians blindly supported in the last election! Make audits stricter and more transparent instead. Prosecute her harshly, along with her family and all her nonexistent friends named after cafés and chips. But don’t sacrifice education for one person’s sins.
Civic interest groups also pointed out anomalous allocations: nearly P20 billion for Congress, P10.6 billion for local governments, and over P500 billion in unprogrammed funds—a potential treasure trove for politicians to score projects on which to stamp their names, and just in time for the elections!
All, while the agencies in charge of public health, social welfare, transportation, college education, agriculture, and labor suffered massive budget cuts!
The Philippine Health Insurance Corp.’s (PhilHealth) subsidies have also been slashed. This contradicts the universal health care law, which stipulates that state subsidies should cover the premiums of sectors (such as the poor, elderly, and marginalized) whose circumstances do not allow them to make PhilHealth contributions, but who need the assistance all the same. Without state subsidies, healthcare services, in general, will also be limited, even with our already high contributions.
Online economist JC Punongbayan said cutting subsidies for PhilHealth also contradicts our Sin Tax Reform Acts, which mandate that the majority of revenues from taxes on tobacco and soda should be allocated to PhilHealth to finance the implementation of universal health care. “Where will these funds go now?” Punongbayan asked.
Healthcare workers haven’t been silent, either. They, too, sent out petitions online to protest the budget. In one such petition, a commenter tried to push for calm by saying that the President has not yet signed the proposed budget and that healthcare workers’ concerns would be reviewed, so people just had to wait.
It looked like an attempt at hope, but it was actually a dismissal of the concerns of those who will be directly affected by the budget cuts and who can see the effects of such cuts on the people they are working to serve.
The call to “just wait” is a warped kind of hope that forces people to see the best in an unfair, unjust situation. It is fake hope because it encourages dependence on the whims, caprices, and signatures of a single person, as though that person were a god or an idol to be worshipped and revered.
And if that person were to indeed veto the budget? Then the person would suddenly look like the noble savior of a troubled people—except the entire process was that of window dressing carried out under the illusion of compassion.
We shouldn’t have to wait for the chief executive to do something. We shouldn’t even be told to “just wait” at all. We shouldn’t have arrived at this point of protests and outrage if we had lawmakers with a genuine heart for public service.
We have to look closely at the lawmakers who staunchly defended the budget cuts in a language of charity meant to deceive rather than enlighten. If they were the same lawmakers who spoke highly of Maharlika funds but turned a blind eye to the removal of social safety nets, then they are merely candidates slavering for funds for the next election.
We already have truly honorable lawmakers, both current and potential, who are protesting the budget and its suspicious provisions. They are the people that we should vote for. They are the people who deserve our attention.
By the time this column is published, the budget will either be scrutinized for constitutional consistency or sent out with a signature.
No matter what happens, we shouldn’t have to wait for leaders to act. We have to distinguish true public service from those who merely want to hold public office.
Let’s actually vote for leaders—not speechmakers, apologists, or puppets who seek ways to make the public serve them.
—————-
iponcedeleon@ateneo.edu