The infallible Supreme Court had validated the evil and immoral pork barrel system.-
Read:
LAWYERS AGAINST MONOPOLY AND POVERTY (LAMP), represented by its Chairman. and counsel, CEFERINO PADUA, Members, ALBERTO ABELEDA, JR., ELEAZAR ANGELES, GREGELY FULTON ACOSTA, VICTOR AVECILLA, GALILEO BRION, ANATALIA BUENAVENTURA, EFREN CARAG, PEDRO CASTILLO, NAPOLEON CORONADO, ROMEO ECHAUZ, ALFREDO DE GUZMAN, ROGELIO KARAGDAG, JR., MARIA LUZ ARZAGA-MENDOZA, LEO LUIS MENDOZA, ANTONIO P. PAREDES, AQUILINO PIMENTEL III, MARIO REYES, EMMANUEL SANTOS, TERESITA SANTOS, RUDEGELIO TACORDA, SECRETARY GEN. ROLANDO ARZAGA, Board of Consultants, JUSTICE ABRAHAM SARMIENTO, SEN. AQUILINO PIMENTEL, JR., and BARTOLOME FERNANDEZ, JR., GR No. 164987, April 24, 2012.
My Commentary:
In the foregoing 2012 Supreme Court decision the issue was the constitutionality and legality of the implementation of the congressional pork barrel system or the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) as provided for in Republic Act (R.A.) 9206 or the General Appropriations Act for 2004 (GAA of 2004).
Petitioner Lawyers Against Monopoly and Poverty (LAMP), a group of lawyers who have banded together with a mission of dismantling all forms of political, economic or social monopoly in the country, sought the issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction or temporary restraining order to enjoin respondent Secretary of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) from making, and, thereafter, releasing budgetary allocations to individual members of Congress as “pork barrel” funds out of PDAF. LAMP likewise aimed to stop the National Treasurer and the Commission on Audit (COA) from enforcing the questioned provision.
The Court DISMISSED the LAMP petition.
It declared the pork barrel system as a constitutional and valid act of the Executive and the Legislative (both of which are the two branches of government responsible for the preparation, deliberation and adoption of the annual budget of the government), citing the doctrine of separation of powers, among other things.
This is precisely why I have always believed that the evil congressional pork barrel system is a massive and mutually satisfying conspiracy (or at the very least, a case of immoral, if not criminal recklessness and tortuous irresponsibility in public policy and in law and jurisprudence) among the three branches of the Phil. government.
The decision cited the earlier case of PHILCONSA v. ENRIQUEZ, G.R. No. 113888, August 19, 1994, 235 SCRA 506, where the Court, agreeing w/ the Executive and the Legislative, described the pork barrel system "as an imaginative and innovative process or mechanism of implementing priority programs/projects specified in the law".
(Imagine, the sweet words used by the Court - "imaginative and innovative"!).
In the Philconsa case, the Court upheld the authority of individual Members of Congress "to propose and identify priority projects because this was merely recommendatory in nature".
(How can one call the system as "merely recommendatory" when the corrupt legislator selects the project, the contractor, the beneficiary (fake) foundation, and the bagman/commission collector?).
In the said case, the Court agreed w/ the Legislative that "the individual members of Congress were far more knowledgeable than the President about the needs of their respective constituents and the priority to be given each project."
(The core constitutional duty of Congress is TO LEGISLATE and TO DO OVERSIGHT. The core constitutional duty to plan, implement, and monitor social justice programs intended to meet the local needs of the people belongs to the Executive, his Cabinet and its line departments, bureaus, agencies, and offices, the NEDA, the heads of the LGUs, and the local, provincial ad regional development councils formed by the Local Govt Code of 1991).
Who says the Supreme Court is infallible, all-knowing, and incapable of serious and destructive errors?
Read the text of the decision and see how the Court in effect ratified the evil pork barrel system.
- Atty. Manuel J. Laserna Jr.
Las Pinas City
