The Duterte administration can tap over P20 billion that are under the proposed national budget for 2022 to help victims of Typhoon Odette.

Senator Sonny Angara, chair of the Senate Committee on Finance, made the statement in response to President Duterte’s statement the government may be having a hard time downloading funds to help typhoon victims since state coffers have already been depleted due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Pag napirmahan na ni PRRD ang 2022 budget, merong over P20-B na magamit para tumulong sa nasalanta at mga nawalan ng bahay at hanapbuhay (Once President Duterte has signed the 2022 national budget, there’s over P20-billion that the govenrment can use to help those who lost homes and livelihood due to the typhoon),” Angara said in a message to reporters.

Angara also said the govenrment can tap savings from the 2021 national budget and can be realigned by the President for calamity response.

“(They) way it was done then was ruled unconstitutional, but (the) power to realign savings is constitutional and must be exercised in certain ways according to SC (Supreme Court’s ruling) in the DAP (Disbursement Acceleration Program) cases,” Angara said.

Senate President Vicente Sotto III, meanwhile, said he would be signing the final copy of the proposed P5.024-trillion 2022 national budget by Thursday, which would then be transmitted to Malacanang.

Sotto said the President is scheduled to sign next year’s appropriation on Dec. 28, 2021: “He is scheduled to sign on the 28th.”

Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, for his part, said the Department of Finance (DOF) can do a “cash sweep” of the released, but undisbursed funds parked in the bank accounts of national government agenices and government owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs).

“I am saddened by the President’s statement that the government has no money to assist the typhoon victims. The DOF can do a “cash sweep” of the released, but undisbursed, funds parked in the bank accounts of national government agencies and GOCCs,” Drilon said.

“This was recently done by the DOF to raise funds needed for the COVID 19 pandemic response. It was shown in the recent budget hearings that national government agencies have very poor disbursement or utilization rates of the funds already released to them. For example, the DPWH disbursed only about 30 percent of the funds released to them,” the minority leader pointed out.

He said funds under the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) can also be realigned for relief operations.

“There are also billions of pesos parked in the coffers of PS-DBM and PITC for unimplemented projects,” he said.

Drilon explained that by doing a “cash sweep”, the projects’ implementation are simply postponed to 2022, since the 2021 GAA is extended to December 2022.

“As they say, if there is a will, there is a way,” Drilon pointed out.