By EUGENE ADIONG
BACOLOD City — Gov. Alfredo Marañon Jr. supported President Benigno Aquino III’s position on the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).
Marañon said the public should be thankful that there was “surplus in the budget.”
He said DAP funds did not reach his pockets but were used for projects beneficial to the people.
“Previous administrations have their versions of DAP,” the governor claimed.
He said that for the critics, everything the Aquino administration does is wrong.
What is clear, he stressed, is that “the economy improved” under the present administration.
Meanwhile, the dean of the University of Saint La Salle’s College of Law here disagreed with the President’s defense of DAP.
“You cannot justify the constitutionality of DAP on the basis of a mere provision of the Administrative Code,” lawyer Ralph Sarmiento said. “You have to justify from provisions of the Constitution itself.”
Sarmiento, however, believes the DAP controversy will not lead to a “constitutional crisis.”
He told Panay News that “there will only be constitutional crisis if there is an impasse between the President and the SC (Supreme Court).”
“PNoy did not say he will defy the SC,” he said.
All the President said was that they will file a motion for reconsideration on the SC declaration that DAP is unconstitutional and ask for a supplemental appropriation from Congress, said Sarmiento.
Everything appears to be within the constitutional framework, he said./PN
