THE PRESIDENT IS on the verge of having to choose between his political career and the love for a son he’s been grooming to follow his footsteps, following a miscalculated exposé on what has become the biggest scandal ever to rock the government.
For one, the revelation made by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on the ghost flood control projects exposed a systemic corruption that has long been embedded in government-funded infrastructure projects.
However, Marcos didn’t quite expect that the scandal would go beyond control after his son, House Majority Leader and Ilocos Norte 1st District Rep. Sandro Marcos, gets dragged into the fund mess.
Data collated by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) showed a national budget marred by billions worth of budget insertions primarily designed to serve the interest of the powers that may be.
ENABLING FUNDS
Funds intended to build bridges connecting people, streetlights making roads safer, and classrooms for the youth literally made the wealthy politicians richer beyond one’s imagination.
The congressional investigations “in aid of legislation” saw the Department of Public Works Highways (DPWH) renege on its mission — to “enable a comfortable life for Filipinos through safe, reliable and resilient infrastructure.”
While the DPWH budget didn’t serve the purpose for which it was allocated, it enabled lawmakers and high-ranking executive officials to pocket billions in kickbacks.
UNLAWFUL PORK
Sometime in 2013, the Supreme Court ruled to declare the Priority Development Assistance Funds (PDAF) or congressional pork barrel unconstitutional.
The ruling effectively restrained the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) from releasing PDAF.
According to the high tribunal, the law’s provisions allowing legislators to determine the funded projects and related practices are deemed to be an abuse of legislative and executive powers.
Aside from PDAF, the tribunal declared the use of Malampaya funds in other projects other than energy-related initiatives as unlawful. It also found releases of the Presidential Social Fund for infrastructure projects without constitutional basis.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
Despite the Supreme Court ruling, pork barrel has remained under the guise of a jargon — allocable, which serves as funds being set aside by the DPWH for congressional districts.
According to a civil society group which calls itself People’s Budget Coalition, allocable funds represent a new form of pork.
“It’s discretionary, politically motivated, and directed toward politically determined projects that crowd out more equitable and accountable public spending.”
Interestingly, the term “allocable” is not mentioned under the General Appropriations Act (GAA) from the time Marcos became President, to date.
HIGHEST ALLOCABLE
According to the data collated by the PCIJ, the highest shares of nearly P1.2 trillion in “allocable” funds have gone to President Marcos’ son Sandro Marcos and former House Speaker Martin Romualdez.
The young Marcos got a whopping P15.8 billion while Romualdez cornered P14.4 billion, from 2023 to 2025.
The remaining 251 district representatives in the previous Congress were each allotted P1 billion to P10 billion in allocables during that period.
Congressmen closely identified with Vice President Sara Duterte however got zero “allocables” in the final version of the 2025 budget.
STARK MISMATCH
The amount of “allocable” for the young Marcos’s congressional district with a population of around 320,000 is twice as much as the P7.8 billion given to Rizal’s first congressional district with a population of 1.2 million.
Documents also showed political maneuvering perpetrated by both legislators and DPWH officials for so-called “non-allocable” projects.
These are projects that the DPWH proposes, supposedly based on an infrastructure masterplan that is premised on poverty alleviation, disaster mitigation, and service provision.
Previously, the late DPWH Usec. Catalina Cabral was asked in a congressional hearing to explain what the term “allocable” meant.
Cabral said that allocable is the “ceiling budget” that each engineering office gets, based on a “parametric formula” that her chief, former secretary Manuel Bonoan, instructed her to make.
MODERN-DAY PORK
According to formrr DPWH Usec. Roberto Bernardo, allocables are the current form of pork barrel but with a twist — amounts are determined by the executive.
Interestingly, lawmakers can decide how those amounts should be spent. Unlike the old pork, “allocables” are itemized and decided on by Congress before the budget is enacted, not after.
With his father at the helm of the executive branch, it’s not surprising the Sandro got the biggest slice of the pork barrel among all district congressmen in 2025.
His father’s first cousin got the second biggest amount.