Only P188.514-M for OVP salaries will be retained

By Rose de la Cruz

Of the proposed P2 billion budget for 2025 of the Office of the Vice President, only P188 million for personnel services of OVP will be retained, as suggested by Rep. Rolando Valeriano (2nd District, Manila), member of the committee on good government and accountability of the House.

In a statement, Valeriano assured OVP civil servants that they would still get their pay in the proposed budget.

However, the rest of the budget will be realigned so that the Filipino people will clearly benefit from the national budget.

Noting the low disbursement rate and slow implementation of OVP socioeconomic programs and to remove the duplication these programs are vis-a-vis existing programs, I suggest to my colleagues that the budget of the Office of the Vice President be approved with the allocation for Personal Services (PS) amounting to P188,514,000.00 remain intact.

Such drastic recommendation stemmed from the recent snob by Vice President Sara Duterte of the ongoing budget hearings on the OVP budget and deferring instead to the judgment of Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez and the committee on appropriations whatever budget her office would be given.

Valeriano’s statement said: “ My own takeaway: The Vice President is now on the defensive because our criticisms are opening the eyes of the people to the reality that the Vice President is a master deceiver who believes her own lies.

Let her believe her own lies but she is no longer fooling the people. That is why she is on the defensive now. Her tantrums during the last OVP budget hearing were a disaster for her. That is the truth. She did the damage all by herself.

We will not play her blame game and stay focused on reviewing the details of the proposed OVP budget.”

The remainder of the P2 billion proposed budget that would have gone to Capital Outlay and MOOE can and might be transferred or realigned to the following agencies as follows:

●     P500 million to the Philippine Sports Commission (to increase the allowances of national athletes and their coaches, and for the allowances of support specialists such as physical therapists, occupational therapists, sports psychologists, nutritionists, and physical conditioning trainers);

●     P500 million to the Department of Social Welfare and Development for AICS, AKAP, TUPAD, Indigent Seniors Citizen Pension, and programs for PWDs and Solo Parents;

●     P450 million to the Commission on Higher Education as additional budget for the Tertiary Education Subsidy (TES); and

●     P398.791 million to the Small Business Corporation as a subsidy for microlending to micro and small enterprises.