MANILA – Budget secretary Benjamin Diokno said Wednesday that Congress will approve the proposed P3.757-trillion national budget for this year by end-January.
Both the Senate and the House of Representatives adjourned for the holidays on Dec. 14, 2018, without passing the proposed General Appropriations Act for 2019.
Congress resumed session on Jan. 14, 2019.
“The budget will be approved by the end of the month and end up on the President’s desk by first week of February,” Diokno said in a forum in Manila on Wednesday.
The Budget chief is certain that lawmakers will pass the 2019 budget so they could focus on the campaign period for the mid-term elections in May.
“Because there’s an election and they will go on recess by Feb. 14 to 15. They will hit the road for their campaign by the middle of February … If they don’t pass the budget we will call them for a special session again and again and again … So that will take time away from their campaign,” Diokno said.
“They must be thinking, this must be done so we can go campaigning. That’s why I’m confident,” he said.
Pending the Congressional approval of the 2019 budget bill, the national budget for fiscal year 2018 is deemed re-enacted as mandated by Section 25 (7), Article VI of the Constitution.
The 1987 Constitution states that, “If, by the end of any fiscal year, the Congress shall have failed to pass the general appropriations bill for the ensuing fiscal year, the general appropriations law for the preceding fiscal year shall be deemed re-enacted and shall remain in force and effect until the general appropriations bill is passed by the Congress.”
Working under a re-enacted budget means that the government cannot fund programs specifically appropriated under the proposed 2019 budget.
The re-enacted budget shall remain in force until the proposed 2019 budget bill is enacted.
“Our position is that this administration should not have a re-enacted budget because we have new projects,” Diokno noted. (GMA News)
