Senate finance
committee summons Abad to explain DAP
By Office of Senator Chiz
Escudero
July 11, 2014
PASAY CITY – The Senate
Committee on Finance has summoned Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch”
Abad to explain before a public hearing scheduled for July 21 the
controversial Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).
The committee hearing is the
continuation of the previous proceedings by the Senate that were
suspended out of courtesy to the Supreme Court, which was then
deliberating the various challenges questioning the legality of the
DAP. The high court declared parts of the government’s spending
mechanism unconstitutional.
Senator Chiz Escudero,
chairman of the finance committee, has directed the secretary of the
Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to submit to the Senate
panel the complete list of the all the Special Allotment Release
Orders or SARO that were disbursed under the DAP, including
“projects/purpose and the amount of the releases.”
“You have been asking us
which among our programs and projects were funded by the DAP… This is
what we have been asking the DBM too since our last committee hearing:
where is the list?” Escudero pointed out.
Escudero wanted Abad to
clarify reports that total disbursed funds under the DAP amounted to
P372 billion, which did not tally with the list provided by the budget
department. “What DBM gave to the committee only amounted to over P200
billion.”
According to Escudero, he
would also ask Abad to identify the fund releases under the DAP that
were considered unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
“If we want to scrutinize
the DAP releases under the guidance of the SC decision, we need all
the papers that only DBM can provide. We are entering the budget
season and on the part of the finance committee, we are carefully
studying the court decision to ensure that the next budget we will be
crafting and approving will be compliant with the Supreme Court
decision on the DAP,” Escudero said.