THE late Public Works undersecretary Catalina Cabral worked out a formula to determine the equitable share of every congressional district from the total public works fund. We can only surmise that the formula was based on the development needs per district, growth potential, demographics, and the multiplier effect that the district funding would contribute to overall growth and development targets. Over the past budget seasons, that formula functioned as an allocation manual at the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH).
It was only recently that the widespread adoption of the so-called “Cabral formula” came to an abrupt end.
During the disastrous term of resigned Ako Bicol Party-list lawmaker Zaldy Co as head of the appropriations committee of the House of Representatives, that formula, which for years indeed determined district allocations based on a math-based formula was jettisoned by Co — in favor of an allocation formula Co himself formulated, according to Cabral’s lawyer. Given media accounts on the many power flexes that were allegedly done by Co during his term as head of the powerful House committee and the multibillion-peso contracts that were reportedly cornered by his construction firms during that time, the claim of Cabral’s lawyer has gained real credibility.
There is another way to describe Co’s flexing of power during his time as head of the appropriations committee: the arrogance of power. Power-tripping in pursuit of alleged juicy public works contractors for his companies and jumbo allocations for his cronies at the House.
The phrase “arrogance of power” comes to mind now because it is what drives many groups within the civil society to seek the scrapping of a 2026 budgetary allocation for so-called soft pork amounting to some P218 billion spread out among several agencies of government.
There is no sugarcoating of what civil society fears. The “arrogance of power” will surely lead to this scenario: the outsized role the politicians, from lawmakers to local government officials, will exercise in determining who benefits from this jumbo fund, which on paper masquerades as a safety net that is supposedly free from the meddling of corrupt politicians. But there is no public fund that exists in the Philippine setting that is sacrosanct and inviolable. That P218 billion, according to civil society groups, is nothing but a giant slush fund that politicians with dirty fingers will use to buy votes and curry political favor.
Adding to the fear of civil society groups is the lack of guardrails to protect the supposed inviolability of the safety net funds. In the real world, do you think politicians will keep their dirty fingers from meddling in how the funds will be used? Specifically, the Big 3 of the P218-billion safety nets, namely:
– The P62-billion AICS, now named Protective Services for Individuals and Families in Difficult Circumstances, which is under the administration of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD);
– The P50-billion Medical Assistance to Indigents and Financially Incapacitated Patients (Maifip) which is with the Department of Health (DOH);
– The P25-billion Tupad, which means Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Disadvantaged at Displaced Workers, and on paper a safety net to be carried out by the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).
On the ground, it will be the DSWD personnel who will oversee the implementation of the AICS, the administrative and the operational side of carrying out the noble (at least on paper) side of the assistance program. But the frontline assistance agency — as sure as the sun rises on the east — will have a very little say on who will benefit from such program, including the level of aid that would be granted to each listed beneficiary. That part will be the almost exclusive turf of politicians, their underlings and their (often thuggish) enforcers. The sole criterion on who will get the aid and what level of aid? Political partisanship.
Even if the DOH claims that there will be none, or very little political meddling on who gets to benefit from the Maifip, consider that a lie. The politicians, guarantee letter or not, will have the ultimate say on at least 90 percent on the money to be disbursed under the program. Do you think the politicians will just allow a fair and need-based system of assisting the sick and physically and financially challenged under the program? No and never.
Politicians operate on the tortured principle to grab what you can of any government assistance program and the Maifip will not be treated as an exception.
All through its corrupted life, which will extend to 2026, the Tupad has been used to employ supporters and ward leaders of politicians. If you were observant enough, the Tupad jobs have mostly involved grass-cutting and street-cleaning done by hordes of political groupies with cheap makeup and in color-coded, long-sleeved crewnecks, oftentimes mimicking the favorite campaign colors of the politicians that put them on the payrolls.
They are not real jobs like tending to irrigation ditches and patching road ruts in the pre-martial law years, jobs that really enhanced the overall well-being of communities, urban or rural. They are not real jobs like those jobs carried out during the depression period in the US under Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal. The Tupad jobs are for the lazy with political connections.
The next big item after the Big 3 is a P10-billion assistance program to be implemented by the Department of Agriculture called the President Assistance to Farmers and Fisherfolk. Because I am a small farmer, I am 100-percent sure that non-farmers will corner a bulk of the P10-billion fund. I will elaborate on that in another column.
