Solon backs move to enact fund to bridge 4Ps deficit

ANOTHER leader of the House of Representatives on Tuesday strongly backed the enactment of a supplemental budget to tackle the pressing P9-billion deficit within the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), as he underscored the urgency of addressing the deficit to uphold justice for the program’s beneficiaries, who have been left without essential financial aid due to budgetary constraints.

House Assistant Majority Leader and Ako Bicol Partylist Rep. Raul Angelo D. Bongalon affirmed his endorsement of Deputy Speaker and Rep. David C. Suarez’s proposal to bridge the gap in the 4Ps, which has left a distressing number of 843,000 families, or 4 million impoverished Filipinos, without the vital support allocated by the program.

“I strongly support this proposal to address the P9-billion deficit in the 4Ps,” Bongalon said. “The 4Ps is a law, and it is our mandate to ensure its implementation. This will give justice to 4Ps beneficiaries who have been deprived of financial aid because of the deficit and the budget cut.”

It was Bongalon who first accused Sen. Imee Marcos of being behind the budget realignment of P13 billion from the 4Ps in the 2023 national budget when she was head of the Senate finance sub-committee in charge of the budget of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

“The longer the deficit stays, the more we deprive these 4 million poor Filipinos of a fighting chance to triumph over poverty. This program is meant to help poor Filipinos for a certain number of years, to help them with their daily needs and send their children to school,” Bongalon said.

If there is a gap in the grant of 4Ps funding to poor Filipino families, Bongalon continued, the objective of the law is not realized, and it will fail to reduce the poverty incidence in the country.

He referred to Republic Act (RA) 11310 (4Ps Act) adding the law’s objective is to reduce poverty incidence in the country.

“Consider a family that was receiving 4Ps benefits, only to suddenly lose them in 2023 and 2024 due to the deficit. What happens to their children who are in school? Will they have to cease their education due to lack of funds? The expenses and needs of our fellow citizens do not cease, thus it is imperative that we address this issue,” emphasized the lawmaker from Bicol.

Earlier, Suarez said he proposed that the House of Representatives pass a supplemental budget to address the P9-billion deficit created by Marcos’ realignment of the 4Ps budget in 2023.

He described the said realignment in last week’s hearing of the House Committees on Public Accounts and Social Services on the privilege speech delivered by 4Ps Partylist Rep. Jonathan Clement M. Abalos II as akin to stealing from poor Filipino families.

The DSWD confirmed the existence of the P9-billion deficit during the hearing of the House Committees on Public Accounts and Social Services last week on the privilege speech delivered by Abalos on the said realignment.

Also, DSWD Secretary Rexlon T. Gatchalian made a confirmation on Marcos’s realignment of P13 billion in 2023 that was supposed to be for the 4Ps but was given to other programs.

Suarez said that when the 2023 national budget was approved in the House of Representatives, the 4Ps funding was complete and intact.