“Flooding” the 2024 National Budget with flood control projects–worth one-quarter of trillion pesos–could lead to “watered down development that drowns out more urgent social spending,” Senator Chiz Escudero said.
The amount proposed for 2024–Php255-B–“looms large by any yardstick,” Escudero said.
“It is too big for tubig,” he pointed out.
The senator said flood control dwarfs what we will spend for new classrooms, hospitals, and irrigation next year.
Total capital outlays, the budgeting term under which infrastructure and equipment fall, is Php24.57-B for the Department of Health (DOH) and Php40.13-B for the Department of Agriculture (DA).
“Flood control even beat our railway budget by over a Php100-B. Railway budget is only Php153-B and irrigation at Php31-B. Parang creek lang ang irrigation while flood control is a mighty river,” he said.
“In fact, flood control is bigger than the entire agriculture budget which has been earmarked Php181-B for 2024,” he said.
“If we are spending more for draining water and dredging rivers than for planting food then what is the justification for this,” Escudero said.
The veteran legislator said the Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP), which President Marcos signed in January this year as the nation’s blueprint for growth for 2023-2028 “barely mentions flood control as a development imperative.”
“Ang kapal ng dokumentong iyan. Tatlong beses lang na-mention ang sa flood-control sa Infrastructure and Disaster Resilience chapters. Wala sa MTPDP na nagsasabi na ang national economic reconstruction ay through canal excavation,” he said.
If, according to Escudero, the national budget is the annualized implementation of the economic plan, the spring from which the budget flows, “then why the oversized importance given to flood control?”
During his Wednesday questioning of economic managers, members of the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) who appeared before senators on Wednesday to defend the 2024 National Budget, he sought the rhyme and the reason for the flood control’s big funding footprint.
“If agriculture is important, why is it that the budget for flood control is bigger than the budget of the Department of Agriculture (DA) or the agriculture sector as a whole?” he continued.
“It is also bigger than the budget of the Department of Social Welfare and Development and that of the Department of National Defense,” he added.
With its problems in the West Philippine Sea, Escudero also asked why the government would spend more on flood control instead of allocating more funds to boost the country’s territorial defense.
Escudero said “flood control is not bad per se. It is needed. To prevent harm being done to people. But it should be at the right amount. Not by opening the floodgates of money.”
He said the recent flooding in Central Luzon should not be used as a “lame excuse to inundate the 2024 National Budget with flood control projects because Region III will only get around Php10-B plus or 4 percent of the total budget.”
He said, “governance is about allocating scarce resources and if the budget and fiscal space is limited then we should allocate properly. “
This is clearly a misallocation of resources that does not even follow the administration’s own economic blueprint and development vision,” he said.