Malacañang’s last-minute tweak of the P6.326 trillion budget for 2025 is still unpopular and viewed by many as the “most corrupt” in history as they vowed to challenge it before the Supreme Court, especially since only P26 billion of the P288 billion congressional insertions, aka pork barrel, still deprives the education sector. The Constitution mandates that the bulk of budget for any given year goes to education, healthcare, and social services.
President Marcos signed the budget bill into law on December 30, not 10 days earlier as scheduled, touting the record-high spending program to spur economic growth and reduce poverty.
Marcos vetoed P194-billion worth of items from the Department of Public Works and Highways — the usual “parking lot” of congressmen for their pork barrel funds — and unprogrammed funds (another source of corruption), which can be easily funded depending on their importance and impact.
However, analysts and stakeholders are not convinced that the veto would address irregularities and inequities as the budget failed to meet the constitutional requirements to prioritize health and education.
EDUCATION AND HEALTH
The education budget was made to look bloated by including funds allocated for non-primary and secondary education, like those for the police and military academies, technical-vocational institutions, and others. But in reality, P10 billion for computerization programs of the Department of Education were slashed.
The budget also slashed completely the proposed P74-billion subsidy for the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth), which subsidises the medical expenses of paying members and shoulders the costs for non-paying indigent groups.
In essence, members paying monthly premiums are being made to shoulder the entire cost of PhilHealth subsidies for non-paying members when the government must be shelling out premiums for them.
With the reduction, the entire 2025 health budget is only P267.8- B, only the fifth highest among all sectors.
Pro-health advocates are set to contest this soon as this violates the universal healthcare and sin tax laws which both mandate allocation to PhilHealth of annual funds from tobacco products and sweetened beverages.
Malacañang may already be preparing for any constitutional challenge that may arise from this…
BEYOND THE PRESIDENT’S POWER
Economist Dr. J.C. Punongbayan said: “I think this is an opportunity for the Supreme Court to lay down the rules concretely because the computation for the education sector’s budget has been a matter of tradition rather than any concrete rule.” The President has no power to restore funds slashed by Congress.
Most of the budgets for education, healthcare and social services were diverted to local infrastructure projects like roads and bridges in the legislators’ districts and unconditional cash transfer like AKAP. Others surmised that this could be for political ambitions.
Under AKAP, minimum wage earners and poor Filipinos get P5,000 each to tide over inflation with a total allocation of P20 billion in 2024. In the budget, this was hiked to P26 billion.
LEGISLATED ELECTIONEERING
As budget analyst Zysa Suzara explained, pork barrel — the practice of allocating public funds for local projects in exchange for constituents’ support for the legislator — is a “legislated electioneering designed to fool the citizenry.”
Suzara also counters Marcos’ claim that the 2025 budget promotes human capital development as “this claim is difficult to reconcile with significant reductions in health and education.”
Marcos’ assurance that AKAP guidelines would be carefully crafted by the departments of labor, social welfare, and economic development was deemed “too late as lawmakers have already been promoting and implementing AKAP since 2024,” Punongbayan stated.
Over the years, he added, that most legislators have ties with construction companies concerning government infrastructure projects.
Punongbayan told the Straits Times: “So I expect the level of patronage in the run-up to the 2025 elections will be quite colossal.”
ANTI-POOR PROVISIONS
The defunding of PhilHealth and reduction in DepEd’s budgets were perceived as “anti poor.” Budget allocations and provisions disproportionately disadvantage the marginalized and neglecting the needs of the poor, worsening current inequalities.
Reduction of the budget for the Office of the Vice President to P733 million was seen as “political persecution” of Sara Duterte and the potential implications for the coming 2028 presidential polls.
Apart from criticizing the budget “as a manifestation of systemic corruption,” it also showed government’s failure to fulfill its commitment to transparency and equitable development, said economist Dr. Anna Rosario Malindog-Uy.
Former Sen. Panfilo Lacson, who is running in the administration’s senatorial slate in May, said: “Malacañang may already be preparing for any constitutional challenge that may arise from this — both before the Supreme Court and the court of public opinion.”
