Estrada to veto 13 items in proposed budget

President Estrada vowed yesterday to veto at least 13 items contained in the "special provisions" of the proposed 2000 General Appropriations Act (GAA) which he said were congressional encroachment into the powers of the Executive Branch.

Mr. Estrada said he cannot allow such "special provisions" that will clearly diminish his powers over the release and use of the annual budget with such insertions by solons requiring "prior clearance" from individual members of Congress before funds for specific infrastructure projects is implemented by the national government.

"I will veto that (special provisions). They cannot encroach into Executive functions. They should stay in the legislative. They are there to make laws but the implementation of the law rests on the powers of the Executive," the President stressed.

However, the President said there is no such P42 billion in the proposed 2000 budget bill which were allegedly inserted by lawmakers.

"That cannot be considered as pork-barrel because the Congressmen cannot get these. They will just identify the projects which are in line with my program, irrigation, schoolbuidling, housing and farm-to-market roads. Because I will not approve them unless it is under these categories," the president said.

Presidential Spokesman Fernando Barican said yesterday President Estrada may be able to sign into law the budget bill this coming Feb. 1.

Executive Secretary Ronaldo Zamora said the President will exercise his line-item veto power to remove "special provisions" allegedly inserted by lawmakers in the proposed 2000 budget bill which require prior concurrence by Congress before any infrastructure projects will be implemented by the Executive Department.

"There have been many special provisions inserted in the budget that requires consultations or concurrence of various members of congress for the execution and implementation of various infrastructure projects, then definitely we will have to take a closer look at our remedy, one of which is of course, presidential veto," Zamora said.