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[av_heading heading=’Budget woes may ‘kill’ Negros Region ‘ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”]
BY MAE SINGUAY
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BACOLOD City – “Budget constraints” might lead to the dissolution of the Negros Island Region (NIR), according to a Malacañang official.
But it would be better for Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Michael Lloyd Dino to explain the fiscal requirements so the issue could be discussed objectively, said Negros Occidental vice governor Eugenio Jose Lacson.
It is not enough to say “budget constraints,” stressed Lacson.
Online news website Rappler.com quoted Dino saying, “There is a very big chance it (NIR) will be abolished because of budget constraints” after a public hearing of the House committee on transportation in Cebu City.
Dino was asked about “unconfirmed reports” that the NIR will be dissolved and its provinces reverted to their old regions, according to the website.
On May 29, 2015 then President Benigno Aquino III signed Executive Order (EO) No. 183, effectively merging Negros Oriental and Negros Occidental into an island region and removing them from Western Visayas and Central Visayas, respectively.
“There is a need to further accelerate the social and economic development of the cities and municipalities [in] the provinces of Negros Occidental and Negros Oriental, and improve the delivery of public services…,” stated EO No. 183.
Local officials, especially those who advocated the merging, described EO No. 183 a “dream come true.”
“We are glad that PNoy (Aquino) gave us what we have long been hoping and praying for,” Negros Occidental governor Alfredo Marañon Jr. then said.
Panay News was still trying to reach Marañon for comment on Dino’s recent statement.
“The conversion to [NIR] hasn’t been fully implemented yet, so it’s not too late for the President to revoke the EO,” the Rappler.com report quoted Dino as saying. “For 2016 and even in 2017, there is no allocation for NIR.”
The Palace official also estimated that a new region like the NIR would “cost the government around P19 billion.”
Speculations on the dissolution started when the NIR’s P42.2-billion proposed budget for 2017 was excluded from the proposed national budget.
Marañon has repeatedly assured Negrenses that the island will remain a region.
“We are functioning as a region already. We have initiated so many programs and projects and these are doing well,” he said in August.
Marañon stressed the NIR is a “nonpolitical region.” “This is beyond politics, this is about progress,” he said. “We will show them that this region will become one of the most progressive in the country.”
Then Interior secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II, an Aquino ally gunning for the presidential post in the May 2016 elections, helped lobby for the creation of the NIR.
Marañon and Negros Oriental governor Roel Degamo supported Roxas’ presidential bid. Roxas won in their provinces, while former Davao City mayor Rodrigo Duterte — the eventual president — placed second.
Just this Oct. 2, Marañon and Duterte met at the opening of the 37th MassKara Festival.
The governor said the President assured him the latter will provide whatever the Negrenses need.
Marañon also said Duterte, current Interior secretary Ismael Sueno and House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez agreed to formally establish the NIR as part of the administration’s campaign for the transition to a federal form of government.
Alvarez suggested that the NIR adopt the island provinces of Siquijor and Guimaras, said the governor.
Lacson stressed a law establishing the NIR is the best way to secure Negros’ present status.
“A law [as] foundation of [the island region], I believe, will be stronger,” he said. “Right now [there is only] an executive order, which I feel can be killed by present or future administrations.”
But Marañon himself is cool on Lacson’s idea. “OK man inâ (law creating Negros Island Region), pero I think the executive order is sufficient,” the governor said.
While Marañon is concerned that an EO may be repealed, he said a law may be repealed, too./PN
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