ARMM may realign budget for BOL plebiscite in 2019

COTABATO CITY: Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao ( ARMM) Gov. Mujiv Hataman has suggested that a fraction of the regional government’s budget for 2019 be realigned for the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) plebiscite scheduled on January 21, 2019 in case funding for the referendum will not come on time.

“We support the BOL all the way and budget should not be a problem, we are recommending to allow part of the ARMM proposed budget to be used for the plebiscite,” Hataman said on Tuesday.

He pointed this out in the wake of reports that there is no allocation in the P3.757-trillion 2019 national budget for the BOL plebiscite, which requires P857 million.

Lawmakers have said the P10-billion budget submitted by the Commission on Elections for 2019 does not include expenditures for the plebiscite.

But Senator Loren Legarda said it is under passed in the middle of the year therefore not funded in the 2018 General Appropriations Act which was signed in December 2017.

Hataman said Congress may realign over P800 million for the plebiscite from the P10.1 billion infrastructure fund for the region proposed by the ARMM next year.

In a media report on Saturday, lawmakers said if the funding problem is not settled in Congress within the succeeding days, one option would be for the Comelec to use its savings from the barangay elections held last May.

Another option would be to seek funding