By Sammy F. Martin
MANILA, (PNA) — Iloilo Congressman Jerry Trenas on Monday said constitutional questions pertaining to the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) can be best resolved by the Supreme Court and until then, there is no reason for the government to suspend its implementation.
Trenas insisted that all point of views, including those coming from legal luminaries like Fr. Joaquin Bernas, are treated as mere opinions and can have no bearing on existing government policies including the controversial DAP because only SC can have the final say on all Constitutional and judicial issues.
“I think that it is best that we bring this issue to the Supreme Court and find out who got the strongest legal position on this matter about the DAP. But until then, I think that there is no legal stumbling block for the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) if it decides to continue implementing DAP,” Trenas said in a statement.
He noted that Congress passes two types of appropriations: programmed and unprogrammed and the difference is that “the former has definite source of financing–projected revenues and borrowings and the latter has none but Congress nonetheless approves the appropriations for items under it in case funding becomes available. They are in the nature of stand-by appropriations.”
“This may come from revenues that exceed target, new sources of revenues or loan proceeds. When any of these is available, the Executive may fund items not in the programmed appropriations but are in the unprogrammed items,” Trenas said.
“For example, if the SC decides with finality this year that coco levy funds are public, said funds (P70B) are new sources of revenue. Government can fund coco bio-engineering projects which are not in the programmed appropriation but are in the unprogrammed budget. Father Bernas refers to the first but is not familiar with the latter,” Trenas concluded.