Mrs. Arroyo was reacting to an allegation by Liberal Party senatorial candidate and Akbayan party-list Rep. Risa Hontiveros that the President poured in at least P459 million worth of projects in the second district of Pampanga where she is seeking a congressional seat.
“Our (national) budget is more than P1 trillion and of course it would go to different districts. Like this place, Calauan, (Laguna), we put in here P600 million,” the President said in her brief message to residents of a government relocation site in the Laguna town.
Mrs. Arroyo visited the 107-hectare relocation site for families displaced by tropical storm “Ondoy” and typhoon “Pepeng” last year.
She said the P600 million was part of the P12-billion total budget allocated for relocation.
“If we put in here P600 million, what more in other areas and districts,” she said.
Malacañang officials hit Hontiveros for her “creative and selective presentation of facts to suit a conclusion she has already made.”
Pittance
Public Works Secretary Victor Domingo said the reported amount was a pittance compared to the billions of pesos badly needed by the region.
While deputy presidential spokesman Gary Olivar said the allegation “did not upset her unduly,” Domingo disclosed that Mrs. Arroyo called him up past midnight Thursday to clarify the reports.
Domingo said the correct amount should have been P200 million and not P459 million. He said P250 million was for the bypass roads sought by investors and locators in Clark and Subic as well as to ease commerce and access to the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport.
He said the P200 million was for flood control projects as the two districts, including Mrs. Arroyo’s, are the lowest in elevation in Pampanga.
The flood projects were designed to benefit nearby provinces as Pampanga acts as catch basin for rainwater coming from mountain ranges.
Domingo said the original government plan was the P3.8-billion Pampanga Flood Development Project that would benefit the provinces of Bulacan, Zambales, Bataan and Tarlac.
He said there was a bigger flood control project for Metro Manila and the entire Southern Tagalog region worth over P30 billion.
“That’s why the amount for the projects there (Pampanga) that is benefiting other provinces is small compared to the actual amounts needed,” he said.
“The sensationalist charge by a senatorial candidate in the opposition about alleged favoritism in infrastructure spending in the President’s home district can only be described, charitably, as a creative and selective presentation of the facts,” Olivar said.
He said the Arroyo administration has so far built a total of 47,800 kilometers of major roads and 289,900 linear meters of bridges from 2001 to 2009, totaling P226 billion, much more than the combined accomplishments of the three immediate preceding governments that lasted a total of over 14 years.
He said the level of spending was further enhanced last year when the government had to adopt a stimulus spending program to protect the economy from the global recession.
Olivar said it was understandable that levels of government spending would vary from one part of the country to another, depending on such factors as the local infrastructure gap, the requirements of investors and demographic growth, and calamity risks, among others.
“In fact, we are sure that there were other districts, not just in Pampanga, where infrastructure spending last year exceeded the P450-million level that the critics claim as a benchmark for favoritism,” he said.
“Sadly, the opposition party behind this latest canard cannot seem to shake its fixation on the President. Instead of treating her like a punching bag, and the presidency as something to be inherited, when will we start hearing from them about platform, record, character and talent?”
“Not only is this thing (spending for Pampanga district) legal, it is also proper, understandable, beneficial to our countrymen who live in that part of the country,” he said.
Nothing wrong
Presidential son Juan Miguel “Mikey” Arroyo said there was nothing wrong with his mother’s huge pork spending for her district in Pampanga.
“What’s wrong with the President addressing the needs of her cabalens? GMA surely does not want to go down in history as a president who failed the aspirations of her townmates,” he said.
“How can you be a good President if you cannot take care of the needs of even your own district?” he asked, taking potshots at Hontiveros.
“The President is merely taking care of the needs of the people the way a good leader should,” he said.
“The president, the vice president, the senators and the congressmen all have their pork barrels. It’s just a question of how they are used,” Arroyo pointed out.
He said Hontiveros’ revelations were a “classic case of a senatorial wannabe resorting to politicking in furtherance of her political ambition.”
He also rebuffed Hontiveros’ accusation that Mrs. Arroyo’s spending smacks of electioneering. “Using her line of reasoning, then all of us who have used our pork barrel for the benefit of our constituents could also be accused of electioneering,” he said.
“And for the record, the president also had an infinity of infrastructure projects constructed for the past years all over the country, including areas where the opposition are in power and this includes Cagayan de Oro,” he said. “Why zero-in on Pampanga only?” he asked.
To the rescue
“Assuming President Arroyo spent that much for her district in Pampanga, there is nothing wrong because the people benefited from the projects and these are properly accounted for,” said administration Rep. Rodolfo Albano III of Isabela.
“And it’s not only in Pampanga that President Arroyo initiated pro-people projects. These are all part of her agenda to improve people’s lives,” Albano added.
Baguio City Rep. Mauricio Domogan appealed to opposition candidates to stop using Mrs. Arroyo in their electoral campaign.
“Using President Arroyo to gain higher rating, votes and political mileage is unfair because she has nothing to do with their bids,” said Domogan, vice chairman of the House committee on justice.
“What is improper and shameless is for supposedly pro-people candidates to keep on criticizing the President without doing anything concrete to help alleviate the plight of the masses,” Domogan said.
“PGMA is not legally barred from running in her district as representative just because she introduced public works projects therein as president of the Philippines,” Maguindanao Rep. Simeon Datumanong said.
“Why attack her on the implementation of projects that are giving relief to the people? The President is doing her very best to provide services for the people and critics should not make an issue out of it because there is nothing wrong,” Zambales Rep. Mitos Magsaysay said.
“When you run for a national position you should be ready with the platform of what you can do for our country. You do not try to muddle the issues,” Rep. Amelita Villarosa said.
Quezon Rep. Danilo Suarez said the P459 million spent for Pampanga’s second district was “no big deal” as other lawmakers “get a lot more than that amount.”
At the Serye Café news forum in Quezon City, Suarez cited news reports about Sen. Edgardo Angara’s “insertions” in the P1.541-trillion national budget for 2010.
“I understand that Sen. Angara has given his province P800 million for this year. That’s on top of a senator’s annual pork barrel allocation of at least P200 million,” he said.
“That’s what you get when you are in power, and Sen. Angara is in power as Senate finance committee chairman,” he said.
Poll rival speaks
Adonis Simpao, Mrs. Arroyo’s only rival in the congressional race, said the President should target the gubernatorial post and not a House seat if she is really serious about helping her province mates.
“If President Arroyo really wants to continue to serve Kapampangans beyond her presidential term as she had declared, she should have filed her candidacy not for Congress in one district, but for Pampanga governor,” Simpao told The STAR in a telephone interview.
“I am happy for projects that benefit the people” but “are we sure that all the funds were really poured into the projects?” he asked.
“We know how close some Pampanga mayors are to the President,” the LP bet said.
Selfish agenda
“The expenditures were driven by purely political considerations - her candidacy. Governance is about allocating scarce resources. She clearly did not govern in this instance,” Sen. Francis Escudero said.
“I do not begrudge those who benefited from this self-serving act. But these allocations show how the politics of patronage has become a norm in the past nine years,” Escudero said.
“This negative example makes it imperative for the next administration to take the necessary steps to prevent fiscal abuses of this nature by future presidents,” he said.
Escudero said his own pork barrel allocations had been withheld since 2005 after he figured prominently in the impeachment moves against Mrs. Arroyo.
Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada said there was nothing wrong in spending for one’s district but Mrs. Arroyo’s move was questionable because of her political plans.
“Still you cannot remove the impression that she is spending much on her district because she will run there as congresswoman,” Estrada said. With Delon Porcalla, Aurea Calica, Ding Cervantes, Evelyn Macairan - By Paolo Romero (Philstar News Service, www.philstar.com)
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