ANGELES CITY – The militant Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (Pamalakaya) has accused the Aquino administration of “grand cover up” by allegedly refusing to name congressmen who partook of the P1.2 billion road users tax since December last year.
Pamalakaya national chairperson Fernando Hicap cited the Commission on Audit as declaring irregularity in the case, “but the President and his budget secretary (Florencio Abad) have yet to do a reality check and honest-to-goodness audit of the abused funds.”
Hicap said “public interest obliges Malacanang and the DBM to reveal the recipients of the P1.2-B fund.”
“Where is transparency here? Where is good governance? It seems to us the release of P1.2 B is grand paycheck to allies of President Aquino at the House of Representatives for their loyalty to and patronage of the Aquino ruling party in Malacanang,” Hicap noted.
He cited a COA report to the Road Board of 2010 saying that “funds for road maintenance went directly to legislators’ districts and not to the Department of Public Works and Highways as required by law.”
“The COA also questioned why the funds were released without specifying the projects to be implemented, and without a request being made by the Road Board. Of the P 1.2 B approved in the December 2010 board resolution, COA said a total of P1.1 billion was released by DBM for 136 projects,” he noted.
COA said the National Capital Region (NCR) received P155 million for 23 projects, followed by Calabarzon with P140 million for 16 projects, Albay got P112 million for 14 projects, and Western Visayas received P110 million for 13 projects.
Hicap also said the release of P1.2 billion road users fund last December 2010 “smacks of corruption and irregularities because of lack of transparency and gross violations of processes and appeared like a concession to rich vote regions where allies of President Aquino served as district congressmen in preparation for the 2013 elections.”
“The NCR has over 11 million registered voters, Calabarzon is fast becoming a major vote rich region in Southern Luzon, Albay is the hometown of Gov. Joey Salceda, a turn coat and now an ally of Aquino, while Western Visayas is the “political bailiwick” of another Aquino ally—Senator Franklin Drilon. Definitely the release is meant to buy political patronage of politicians and de facto vote buying as early as this year,” said Hicap.
As this developed, Pamalakaya asked Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and House Speaker Feliciano Belmonte to pursue a separate congressional inquiry into the alleged irregularities on the disbursement of Road users’ tax.
The militant group said Enrile and Belmonte should cross party lines and investigate fellow lawmakers and other government officials in the regions specified as recipients of the P 1.2 billion road users tax released by DBM since December last year.
“The congressmen in these regions should reply to allegations that they received undeclared and unreported pork barrels courtesy of the P1.2 billion road users’ tax,” Hicap also said.
