DBM SET TO SUBMIT P5.628T BUDGET
THE SAME PRIORITIES HOLD TO THE CONSTITUTION REQUIRE THE BIGGEST BUDGETARY ALLOCATION FOR EDUCATION.
The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) is set to submit the documents of the P5.628-trillion national budget for 2023 to the President and Congress next month, Malacañang said on Friday.
“DBM is scheduled to submit the budget documents to the President on 19 August 2022, not next week as mentioned earlier on the press briefing, and the same is expected to be submitted to Congress on 22 August 2022,” Press Secretary Trixie Cruz Angeles told reporters in a press conference.
She confirmed that President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. met with DBM officials on Friday morning to discuss next year’s spending plan.
Budget officials presented its proposed government expenditures which they would submit to Congress next month.
“The same priorities hold to the Constitution require the biggest budgetary allocation for education. So it’s still the same. No significant difference compared to last year’s budget. I would like to remind you most of the budget was created by the last administration,” Angeles noted.
She failed to say how much will be allocated for the Covid-19 response, saying that the budget is still being “fine-tuned.”
“Different secretaries gave
some inputs for the fine-tuning,” she said.
Angeles said after Friday’s special Cabinet meeting, the DBM shall “undertake the printing of the Budget Documents, which includes the printing of the National Expenditure Program, Budget of Expenditures and Sources of Financing, Staffing Summary, and the President’s Budget Message.”
During the Post-State of the Nation Address Economic Briefing last week in Pasay City, DBM Secretary
Amenah Pangandaman bared that the Marcos administration is eyeing a P5.2 trillion national budget for 2023.
Large chunks of the budget will be allocated for education, health, social safety nets, infrastructure and agriculture programs.
Meanwhile, DBM data showed that 93 percent or P4.68 trillion of the P5.02-trillion national budget for 2022 has already been disbursed before former President Rodrigo Duterte’s term ended.