DAVAO CITY – Militant workers group Kilusang Mayo Uno said the 2016 national budget might be “historic”, but said it could be use for “corruption and patronage”.
Elmer Labog, chairperson of KMU, in a statement said: “passing a national budget before the year ends is not proof that national coffers are not being plundered.”
“Public funds are still not being spent for the Filipino workers and people,” he said.
Labog said the P436.5-billion budget for the DepEd is allotted to the implementation of the K+12 program, “which aims to produce cheap and repressed Filipino labor and deny the majority of Filipino youth a chance to go to college.”
“The P400.4-billion budget for the DPWH and a segment of the DILG budget will surely go to corruption and patronage in connection with the 2016 national elections,” said Labog.
Labog said roads that were in fine condition have been destroyed and repaired so that politicians can get their kickbacks all over Metro Manila.
Independent think-tank Ibon Foundation has earlier warned that mechanisms similar to the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), responsible for increasing presidential pork, are retained in the proposed budget and that other pork barrel funds have been increased.
Ibon has also warned the public of the existence of no less than P65.9 billion funds for projects under the Public-Private Partnership program. It said a big segment of the fund will be subsidies for the profits of Aquino’s cronies, the big capitalists who are beneficiaries of the PPP program.
“Instead of implementing genuine agrarian reform and national industrialization in order to create decent jobs, Aquino is allotting P62.7 billion for the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) conditional cash transfer program. The 4Ps is a palliative that won’t solve widespread joblessness, landlessness, poverty and hunger in the country,” said Labog.
The group also challenged the president to file more corruption charges against former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. (davaotoday.com )
