The Joker protests points
We take exception to some points raised in the Oct. 3 editorial titled “Sexy revenge.” It says, “But the information available—the fact that an announcement was made in 2011, that the projects Arroyo requested funding for (the money for which came out of DAP) are aboveboard…”
No such announcement or request could have been made for the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) in 2011. Until the Department of Budget and Management released the P50 million to P100 million DAP releases in October 2012 allegedly to senators (“Post-impeachment pork: Drilon, JPE top list,” Front Page, 9/29/13), nobody knew of its existence.
The editorial proceeds with the view that the DAP program “does not suggest either unconstitutionality or corruption.” We strongly disagree. Neither the Constitution nor the Administrative Code, relied upon by Malacañang, allows the executive to use savings at will, without statutory standards consistent with the conditions provided for in the Constitution.
The editorial says Arroyo was “resolutely silent on corruption issues against the Macapagal-Arroyo administration…”
Then Senator Arroyo opposed President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on many major issues before no less than the Supreme Court and won therein: the Venable contract, which involved the use of American money to change the Constitution and the People’s Initiative to do the same; the emasculation of Congress by Executive Order No. 464 on executive privilege. He fought to put the Presidential Commission on Good Government back under the coverage of the law when it attempted to rise above it, and Proclamation No. 1017, which curtailed freedom of assembly and freedom of the press. In the Senate, he reported out and condemned anomalous deals and contracts involving Piatco, the tax credit scandal, Napocor and Masinloc biddings, the Bolante fertilizer scam, and as cochair of the investigating committee of the Senate, he wrote a separate opinion on the investigation of the ZTE scandal.
Lawmakers, according to the editorial, have “no business recommending funding for projects, no matter how laudable.” Quite the contrary: In our Constitution, Congress has the power of the purse and as such, lawmakers have the constitutional duty to review the president’s proposed budget and introduce amendments thereto. That is sanctioned under the Constitution and that is the constitutional practice in the United States, Europe, Japan etc.
Tying the hands of legislators will reduce Congress into a mere rubber stamp, the practice in parliaments in autocratic countries. The editorial asserts, “Arroyo did not bother to find out where the money for his projects came from, as long as he knew where it was going.” The editorial writer appears not to have read what the Inquirer published. Then Senator Arroyo introduced amendments to the proposed 2013 budget in December 2012 for his projects. Sen. Franklin Drilon, then Senate finance chair, assured Senator Arroyo that his amendments would be incorporated in the budget. On Feb. 3, 2013, he wrote Senator Drilon for the release of those funds. He did not get an answer. Eight months later, on Sept. 28, 2013, the DBM released a list of DAP releases to senators and included the name of Senator Arroyo among them. He promptly protested because he did not ask anything from DAP (“Joker lays bribery at Palace doorstep,” Front Page, 9/30/13), consistent with his position at the outset not to avail himself of the Priority Development Assistance Fund, long before the exposé on the Napoles pork barrel scam.
—DELFIN ESPIRITU,
chief of staff to then Sen. Joker Arroyo
