Why Duterte allies Ungab, Vic Rodriguez say 2025 budget unconstitutional

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Allies of former president Rodrigo Duterte are knocking on the doors of the Supreme Court to sue the brains behind the 2025 national budget.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s former executive secretary Vic Rodriguez and Davao City 3rd District Isidro Ungab led a group of petitioners calling on the Supreme Court to declare the 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA) unconstitutional.

The respondents in the petition are House Speaker Martin Romualdez, Senate President Chiz Escudero, and Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin.

Below is a summary of their arguments against the constitutionality of the budget.

GAA violates the Universal Health Care Act (UHCA)

The spending bill signed by President Marcos into law gave zero budget for the subsidy of state health insurer Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth). Lawmakers who removed funding for the state health insurer said it would be best for Philhealth to tap into its reserve funds worth hundreds of billions of pesos.

Petitioners argued that the UHCA “never envisioned direct contributors as its workhorse to fund PhilHealth.” They pointed out that the law also stipulates that funding for the law shall also be sourced from the annual budget of the Department of Health and the national government’s subsidy to PhilHealth as indicated in the GAA.

“Instead of allocating said excess funds to decrease the amount of member’s contributions and to increase the program’s benefits in accordance with Section 11 of the UHCA which would have alleviated the latter’s burden of paying premiums after premiums to PhilHealth, said excess funds would now be utilized for the operational budget of the PhilHealth thereby deviating from the law’s goals,” the petition read.

GAA illegally increased proposed budget appropriations for Congress, other line agencies

In the petition, the Duterte camp flagged the spike in the proposed budget for the House of Representatives, from P16.35 billion under the National Expenditure Program, to P33.67 billion as revised by lawmakers. The Senate’s budget proposal also slightly increased during deliberations, from the initial P12.83 billion to P13.93 billion.

The petitioners’ argument is premised on a constitutional provision that states: “The Congress may not increase the appropriations recommended by the President for the operation of the government as specified in the budget. The form, content, and manner of preparation of the budget shall be prescribed by law.”

The legislative branch actually just maintained the total appropriations proposed by the executive at P6.3 trillion. Petitioners, however, insisted that the “steep increase in the appropriations of Congress…is definitely the evil that the constitutional provision sought to prevent.”

“If we are to strictly abide by the letter of the constitutional provision, it is only the form, content, and manner of preparation of the budget which shall be within the ambit of the legislative powers. It is beyond cavil that a blatant increase in the budget, of Congress at that, undertaken by Congress itself is violative of the constitutional mandate,” the petition also read.

Public works sector received highest allocation in the GAA, instead of education

The 1987 Constitution mandates the state to “assign the highest budgetary priority to education.” When the budget was signed into law, the Department of Budget and Management insisted that such was the case: P1.055 trillion for education, followed by the public works sector with P1.007 trillion.

Critics, however, have pointed out that the computation for the budgetary allocation for education includes agencies that, in previous years, were under non-education sectors, such as the Local Government Academy, Philippine National Police Academy, and Philippine Military Academy.

Petitioners said the makers of the budget “feigned compliance” by putting P15.28 billion under the category of education, even though they weren’t supposed to be there.

“The budget appropriations to the education sector were merely bloated to give the impression of a superficial adherence to the constitutional mandate,” the petition read.

Blanks on the bicameral report tantamount to grave abuse of discretion

The most recent controversy surrounding the budget involves the discovery of blanks in the bicameral conference committee report, which contained the final amendments subsequently ratified by Congress, before the enrolled copy was sent to President Marcos’ desk.

It was Ungab who first flagged the unfilled line items, but allies of the administration later insisted that legislative technical staff were authorized to make final ministerial corrections.

The petitioners said the bicameral delegates committed grave abuse of discretion.

“While it is true that the bicameral conference committee has the power to reconcile the conflicting provisions from the Senate version and the House version of the 2025 GAA, it is prohibited from amending provisions without clearly stating the version to which it should be amended to,” the petition read.

Response

Speaker Romualdez said he will review the petition filed with the Supreme Court, while Senate President Chiz Escudero disputed the allegations.

“This is an unfair comment and accusation,” he added.

Aside from Ungab and Rodriguez, other signatories to the petition were Rogelio Mendoza, Benito Ching Jr., Redemberto Villanueva, Roseller dela Pena, Santos Catubay, and Dominic Solis. – Rappler.com