‘2020 budget signing likely to happen in early January’

PRESIDENT Duterte will not be able to sign the P4.1-trillion national budget for 2020 before the year ends, given the time constraints as it has to undergo the required review by the Office of the President and the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).

Acting Budget Secretary Wendel E. Avisado said in an interview on Thursday that the 2020 budget is now scheduled to be signed by the President by the first week of January.

He said there will also a ceremonial signing of the 2020 General Appropriations Act in Malacañang.

“Given [the] time constraints, [because of the] holiday…so probably [it will be] first of January. But that’s okay. The new year has just started, and there won’t be so many activities that time,” Avisado told the BusinessMirror, in a mix of English and Filipino, on the sidelines of the public launch of the Philippine Open Government Partnership National Action Plan 2019-2021.

The President earlier expected to sign the budget before year-end.

Asked if the pushback in schedule of the signing of the 2020 national budget had something to do with the alleged last-minute insertions as claimed earlier by Sen. Panfilo Lacson, Avisado said: “Hindi naman po [Not really]. It’s really the process that has to be undertaken [where a review is to be done].”

The budget chief also refused to comment on the alleged insertions as they have yet to get hold of a copy of the enrolled bill.

“Hindi ko pa po masasabing insertion kasi wala naman po ako doon. At hindi ko naman alam kung ano ’yung proseso [I can’t say it’s an insertion because I wasn’t there, and I don’t know what process they took]. But we’re saying that we’ll be able know that once we get hold of the enrolled bill [because then we can compare the] NEP [National Expenditure Program] as submitted versus the enrolled bill.”

Lacson earlier skipped the signing of the bicameral report on the money measure because of his concerns on the alleged last-minute insertions.

The senator claimed that there are still “lump sums” and “vaguely described” projects in the bicameral report.

The senator’s office reportedly received a USB flash drive containing a list of 1,253 budget items worth P83.219 billion that was allegedly used as the congressmen’s “source” of their “list” of 742 projects worth P16.345 billion that were inserted in the bicameral report.

Section 5 (7), Article VI of the 1987 Constitution reads: “If by the end of any fiscal year, Congress failed to pass the General Appropriations Bill (GAB) for the ensuing year, the General Appropriations Act (GAA) for the preceding year shall be deemed reenacted and shall remain in force and in effect until the GAB is passed by Congress.”

This year, the government was forced to operate on a reenacted budget for months since the passage of the 2019 national budget got delayed due to a number of issues, including alleged last-minute insertions and realignments by lawmakers.

The President was only able to sign the budget on April 15 this year.

Due to the budget impasse, new and continuing infrastructure projects were not started earlier in the year when the weather conditions were better. On top of that, the government also had to comply with the election ban from March 29 until May 12.

The delay in the passage of the budget was also blamed for the slower GDP growth for the first quarter and second quarter at 5.6 percent and 5.5 percent, respectively. This is lower than the 6.6 percent and 6.2 percent recorded last year.

https://businessmirror.com.ph/2019/12/20/2020-budget-signing-likely-to-happen-in-early-january/