How to turn Philippine legislators into REAL public servants #scrappork #porkbarrel

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Mathematically, we can say patronage politics is a function of pork barrel (presidential and PDAF). You need pork barrel to grease politicians to do the bidding of the executive branch.

Therefore, to stop the mismanagement of government budgets annually, we need to zero out patronage politics to eliminate pork barrel in the system. Setting it to zero requires that we have to find a minimum positive value/number of legislators in both houses.

How does one do it ? Call for an immediate rewrite of the Philippine Constitution. We need to enshrine legislative transparency, integrity and efficiency in the Philippine Constitution by indicating the parameters of legislation and expectations from legislators :

(1) We need to set a maximum salary ceiling for legislators equal to 10% of their provincial INTERNAL REVENUE ALLOTMENT. Legislators like any other workers should work hard for their salaries.

(2) They are expected to report for work using public transportation like buses, jeeps and taxis.

(3) They should be paid only for the days they attend the legislative sessions. All absences and holidays are not paid by taxes paid by the people.

(4) They should have no budgeted government service vehicles unless it is a manual bicycle.

(5)They should have no budgeted government fund for bodyguards except one driver, one secretary, and one technical staff.

(6.1)Legislators are not allowed to propose congressional insertions in any agency and lumpsum budget.

(6.2) Legislators shall indicate in their own website/folder within the Congress website, detailed accounting of their monthly pay slip and emoluments plus all financial documents of their individual budget activities on a monthly basis.

(6.3) Legislators should post their ANNUAL SALNs in their website/folder within the Congress website.

(7) Final budget approval or third reading should be on the floor. Legislative budget chairmen of both Congress and Senate and DBM secretary should not make the final approval of the budget in close session.

(8) For contingency purposes and/or in cases of calamities or disasters, additional budgetary allocations should come from the contingency fund of the executive branch.

(9) And lastly, there shall be no discretionary/unprogrammed fund for the President. All funds should be line-itemized and audited immediately after the fiscal year. All audits of government budget must be finished within the first quarter after the fiscal year. All legislators who have not submitted the complete financial documents supporting their budget plan should be identified and pay a fine corresponding to 25% of their annual salary. Such fines shall be automatically deducted from salary and indicated in their pay slip.

Source:
http://getrealphilippines.com/blog/2013/08/pnoy-misled-public-on-pork-barrel-funds-its-still-in-the-budget-and-legislators-still-want-it/comment-page-1/#comment-129044

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