Record expenses for Rody in 2017 budget

MANILA, Philippines – President Duterte will incur record expenses as the country’s chief executive, his proposed P3.35-trillion 2017 national budget shows.

Duterte will have P7.6 billion for representation expenses, including for entertainment, and a P2.5- billion intelligence fund.

The representation allocation of his predecessor, former president Benigno Aquino III, was a drop in the bucket at P139.3 million.

Duterte’s intelligence fund is five times bigger than that of Aquino’s P500 million. The P2.5 billion is on top of the intelligence money of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, Philippine National Police and other agencies, including the Department of Justice.

The incumbent president will have P2.1 billion for “professional services,” the budget language for consultants. Aquino had only P78.9 million for this purpose this year, half of which was presumably inherited by Duterte.

Rent expenses will jump astronomically from P49 million to P2.3 billion, as will communication expenses, from P23.9 million to P1.3 billion.

Spending for communications of the President’s office is separate from the one by the Presidential Communications Office, which has its own budget.

Duterte’s travel fund will also increase significantly, from P313.2 million to P2.1 billion.

The President will also have P500 million for new machinery and equipment and P160 million for new furniture, fixtures and books.

These expenses are the biggest expenditure items in the budget of the Office of the President, which will jump to P20.030 billion in 2017 from just P2.9 billion this year. OP salaries will amount to P747 million.

Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno attributed the huge increase to expenditures related to ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) activities.

The Philippines is hosting ASEAN next year, which is the group’s 50th anniversary.

A congressman, who did not want to be named, said the country hosted the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ summit last year even if the OP under Aquino had a budget of only P2.6 billion.

While Duterte’s office will have an extraordinarily huge budget increase, funding for the office of Vice President Leni Robredo will go down by P70 million, from P503.8 million this year to P433.5 million.

Of Robredo’s outlay, only P66 million is for salaries, while the bulk of P357.3 million is for maintenance and other operating expenses (MOOE).

The biggest item in her MOOE allocation is “financial assistance/subsidy” amounting to P117.6 million, which some congressmen described as a pork barrel fund and which Robredo could use for the same purpose as her P70-million annual Priority Development Assistance Fund allocation when she was Camarines Sur congresswoman.

Robredo’s predecessor, former vice president Jejomar Binay, used a large part of the money for medical assistance extended through government hospitals.

The Vice President will have P37.7 million for travel, P27.9 million for consultants, P11 million for rent, P6.8 million for equipment and P3.4 million for new vehicles.

She is renting the Boracay Mansion of former president Joseph Estrada in New Manila, which the Quezon City government now owns and which it calls Executive House.

The city government is acquiring another former Estrada property nearby for Robredo’s security detail.