At the start of Senate debates on the 2024 budget, various groups including farmers and rural-based sectors reiterate the call to #AbolishConfidentialFunds. Various groups representing taxpayers and budget stakeholders call on the Senate to remove around 10 billion worth of confidential and intelligence funds from the proposed 2024 budget to fund public hospitals, schools, housing programs, food production, and other social services.
“KMP, AMIHAN, PAMALAKAYA, and UMA are joining the series of mass actions and lobbying efforts in the Senate to persuade our legislators to abolish all confidential funds. We hope they will listen to our people’s demands. We hope the 2024 budget undergoes a judicious deliberation process at the Senate to ensure transparency, accountability, and the welfare of Filipinos above all.”
We demand the abolition of confidential funds and other funding allocations similar to the pork barrel. Such lumpsum funds, being discretionary, confidential, and not subject to regular auditing procedures of the Commission on Audit, could naturally lead to corruption and abuse. A clear case in point is the recent revelation about President Marcos’ anomalous transfer to, and Vice President Duterte’s anomalous use of, P125 million worth of CIF funds in 2022 in blatant violation of existing guidelines on the CIF.
Instead of maintaining the CIF, we propose that the said CIFs and other inappropriate budget allocations, be realigned to the construction and repair of hospitals, health facilities, and public schools; to augment the salaries and benefits of teachers, health workers, and other government employees; to provide production subsidies to small farmers and fisherfolk; or housing to poor families, among other more urgent needs.
According to the #AbolishConfidentialFunds Campaign Network, from P1.58 billion in 2016, confidential and intelligence funds (CIFs) have ballooned dramatically to P10.14 billion in the proposed 2024 budget.
This includes P4.6 billion under the Office of the President, and P650 million under the offices of the Vice President and DepEd Secretary, which dwarf the combined allocations of the entire security and intelligence sector.
While the House of Representatives has already acted on the public clamor and realigned several excessive and unnecessary CIFs, much work remains to be done in the Senate and the subsequent Bicameral Conference Committee where amendments are usually finalized. We are gravely concerned over the news that some senators are planning to reinstate the P650 million confidential funds of the OVP and DepEd. On the contrary, more has to be done to remove all confidential funds from the 2024 budget.
A total of 28 agencies have requested confidential funds totaling P4.9 billion, while nine agencies have requested intelligence funds totaling P5.3 billion. The unprecedented increases in CIFs began during the Duterte administration and have continued under the current dispensation.
Because of its nature and its exemption from regular auditing rules, CIFs are not transparent, difficult to account and therefore prone to corruption and abuse.
#AbolishConfidentialFunds finds it unacceptable for CIFs to have increased so much even as the budgets for economic and social services continue to decline, with many public hospitals, schools, housing, and social welfare programs experiencing budget cuts in 2024 and previous years.
We are asking Congress and Senate to unconditionally realign CIFs to health, education, housing, and other social services; higher salaries and benefits for teachers, health workers, and other government employees; subsidies to small farmers and fisherfolk; and other urgent needs of our people.
