By Ellson Quismorio
The Department of Budget and Management's (DBM) proposed cash-based budget for 2019 will "severely hamper" the government's implementation of the celebrated free college tuition law.
Appropriations Committee Chairman, Davao City 1st district Rep. Karlo Nograles learned this first-hand from Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) Officer-in-Charge, Commissioner Prospero de Vera III during the commission's budget presentation Thursday afternoon at the House of Representatives.
Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles
(Federico Cruz / File | Manila Bulletin) "We're very concerned with cash-based budgeting in terms of implementation of the free higher education law which we (House) funded in 2018 with P40 billion and we're funding in 2019 with P50 billion," Nograles said in his interpellation of De Vera. The Mindanao lawmaker was referring to Republic Act (RA) No. 10931 or the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act, the post-enactment funding of which was the biggest victory of Appropriations panel last year. "Realistically cash-based budgeting, you will only be able to spend from the P50 billion what is billed to you by the SUCs (State Universities and Colleges) for the first semester. What happens to the second semester and the other half of the P50 billion?" Nograles asked. "We will be severely hampered in implementing RA 10931 because the first semester for some universities start in June...at the earliest maybe toward the end of July that's the earliest they can submit to us . So we will be able to process that maybe at the fastest by September. So that's OK for the first sem," De Vera said. The DBM's P3.757-trillion national budget for 2019, which is cased-based in nature, is tailor-made to finish all payouts within the given fiscal year. This creates a problem for tuition reimbursements for the second semester, which according to De Vera starts in November for SUCs that follow the regular academic year. It's possible that the billing and subsequent reimbursement requests from these schools could lapse into 2020, and by that time CHEd can no longer use money allocated for 2019. "How do we compute the reimbursement? Do we compute it only until December, the fiscal year? Or can we give the whole money all the way until April when the students graduate?" asked the perplexed De Vera. "The problem is that the fiscal year and the academic year don't necessarily go hand-in-hand," observed Nograles. "With cash-based budgeting, hindi pwedeng i-advance yan (You can't make advanced payments). You can't make assumptions, right? Otherwise baka ma-Ombudsman kayo (You might get charged by the Ombudsman)," Nograles said. The CHEd official concurred, noting, "We can reimburse only for actual live students. There's some system of certification and verification that will come in." Tuition, miscellaneous and other similar school fees are free under RA 10931. Covered by the law are the country's 114 SUCs, 16 Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs) accredited by Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) and 122 Technical-Vocational Institutions (TVIs) under the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA). Alarming In his presentation, De Vera told the Appropriations panel that the CHEd's allocation of P50.443 billion under the 2019 National Expenditure Program (NEP) or proposed national budget is lower than their P50.533 billion allocation last year. De Vera also bared that the government has zero allocations next year for scholarship programs such as the Scholar ng Bayan, Tulong Dunong, as well as CHEd's medical scholars. He said those students enrolled in private schools will suffer the most because they won't have the benefits of RA 10931 to fall back on. "Very alarming to (This is very alarming)," commented Nograles, who since last week has been expressing concern over the budget cuts that various agencies are getting under the proposed 2019 budget. There is now a move among congressmen to return the 2019 NEP back to the DBM in favor of an obligations-based budget, which is the traditional budget scheme. Meanwhile, Nograles was somewhat irked in the hearing when a DBM representative blamed the government's free tuition program for CHEd's lowered capital outlay for SUCs next year. Capital outlay is used for infrastructure development. "I take exception to the reasoning that it was because of free higher education that they cut out capital outlay. We will never agree to that. The intent of capital outlay is to increase the capacity of SUCs so that we can accommodate more students; more poor students would be able to avail of free higher education. "Let's not blame for cutting capital outlay. The reason why there's a cut is because of this cash-based budgeting and because DBM came to us with a lower budget," he said. The current national budget is worth P3.767 trillion.
Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles(Federico Cruz / File | Manila Bulletin) "We're very concerned with cash-based budgeting in terms of implementation of the free higher education law which we (House) funded in 2018 with P40 billion and we're funding in 2019 with P50 billion," Nograles said in his interpellation of De Vera. The Mindanao lawmaker was referring to Republic Act (RA) No. 10931 or the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act, the post-enactment funding of which was the biggest victory of Appropriations panel last year. "Realistically cash-based budgeting, you will only be able to spend from the P50 billion what is billed to you by the SUCs (State Universities and Colleges) for the first semester. What happens to the second semester and the other half of the P50 billion?" Nograles asked. "We will be severely hampered in implementing RA 10931 because the first semester for some universities start in June...at the earliest maybe toward the end of July that's the earliest they can submit to us . So we will be able to process that maybe at the fastest by September. So that's OK for the first sem," De Vera said. The DBM's P3.757-trillion national budget for 2019, which is cased-based in nature, is tailor-made to finish all payouts within the given fiscal year. This creates a problem for tuition reimbursements for the second semester, which according to De Vera starts in November for SUCs that follow the regular academic year. It's possible that the billing and subsequent reimbursement requests from these schools could lapse into 2020, and by that time CHEd can no longer use money allocated for 2019. "How do we compute the reimbursement? Do we compute it only until December, the fiscal year? Or can we give the whole money all the way until April when the students graduate?" asked the perplexed De Vera. "The problem is that the fiscal year and the academic year don't necessarily go hand-in-hand," observed Nograles. "With cash-based budgeting, hindi pwedeng i-advance yan (You can't make advanced payments). You can't make assumptions, right? Otherwise baka ma-Ombudsman kayo (You might get charged by the Ombudsman)," Nograles said. The CHEd official concurred, noting, "We can reimburse only for actual live students. There's some system of certification and verification that will come in." Tuition, miscellaneous and other similar school fees are free under RA 10931. Covered by the law are the country's 114 SUCs, 16 Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs) accredited by Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) and 122 Technical-Vocational Institutions (TVIs) under the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA). Alarming In his presentation, De Vera told the Appropriations panel that the CHEd's allocation of P50.443 billion under the 2019 National Expenditure Program (NEP) or proposed national budget is lower than their P50.533 billion allocation last year. De Vera also bared that the government has zero allocations next year for scholarship programs such as the Scholar ng Bayan, Tulong Dunong, as well as CHEd's medical scholars. He said those students enrolled in private schools will suffer the most because they won't have the benefits of RA 10931 to fall back on. "Very alarming to (This is very alarming)," commented Nograles, who since last week has been expressing concern over the budget cuts that various agencies are getting under the proposed 2019 budget. There is now a move among congressmen to return the 2019 NEP back to the DBM in favor of an obligations-based budget, which is the traditional budget scheme. Meanwhile, Nograles was somewhat irked in the hearing when a DBM representative blamed the government's free tuition program for CHEd's lowered capital outlay for SUCs next year. Capital outlay is used for infrastructure development. "I take exception to the reasoning that it was because of free higher education that they cut out capital outlay. We will never agree to that. The intent of capital outlay is to increase the capacity of SUCs so that we can accommodate more students; more poor students would be able to avail of free higher education. "Let's not blame for cutting capital outlay. The reason why there's a cut is because of this cash-based budgeting and because DBM came to us with a lower budget," he said. The current national budget is worth P3.767 trillion.