The Office of the President’s (OP) proposed P10.645 billion budget for 2024 was approved by the Senate plenary on Thursday, November 9, retaining as well its P2.3 billion intelligence funds.

The confidential and intelligence funds of the OP are worth P4.56 billion based on the National Expenditure Program (NEP) of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) which is almost half of the proposed budget for 2024.

Prior to its approval, Senate Minority Leader Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel questioned the rationale behind the Office of the President's (OP) intelligence funds given that it is a civilian office.

"I believe that the OP is a civilian office, not a uniformed and military, composed of uniformed and military personnel, and even if it may have some of them it that should not be highlighted because the constitutional policy is we should always highlight civilian supremacy over the military," he said.

"I don’t think the OP is composed of intel practitioners. The President himself and as well as his office are consumers of intelligence already gathered and organized by the intelligence practitioners under which are the agencies, some agencies under the OP in the executive branch," he added.

While he mentioned that he has no issue with the grant of confidential funds to the OP which is a civilian government agency with multi-dimensional, multi-faceted operations, responsibilities, and tasks, Pimentel stated that his issue is with the intelligence expenses because the governing document, defined this as referring to those related to intelligence information gathering activities of uniformed and military personnel as well as intel practitioners that have direct impact to national security.

He was referring to the Joint Memorandum Circular (JMC) 2015- 01 issued by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM), the Commission on Audit (COA), the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), the Department of National Defense (DND), and the Governance Commission for the GOCCs (GCG) on January 8, 2015 which prescribed “guidelines on the entitlement, release, use, reporting and audit of confidential and/or intelligence funds.”

Regarding the amount, Senate Committee on Finance chief Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara stated that it is the amount that has been set since 2020.

On the reason why the OP requested it, Angara said that the answer given by Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin is that the President is both the user and generator of confidential and intelligence information. He added that as the Commander-in-Chief, the President needs to make very crucial decisions and that the importance of information cannot be understated.

"The possibility he gets filtered information should be bypassed or should not be there. Although perfect information is impossible in this day and age, he should be receiving as reliable as wide as possible information," Angara said.

Pimentel pointed out that the joint circular was crafted by DBM and COA, with DBM being under the direct control of the OP. What happens here, according to him, is that intelligence fund usage, the reports are submitted to the OP, or before the intelligence funds can be tapped they have to be requested from the OP.

"Then our system says that that office itself has its own intelligence fund so nasira yung controls and checks system po natin (so our controls and checks system gets disrupted). I mean that’s the entire checking system eh, that there is that OP which controls, regulates, supervises, and checks the usage of the intel funds,"

"Yet mismong siya ay binibigyan ng (that office itself gets) intellligence funds so he reports to himself. So that is the weakness of how we have interpreted and implemented this joint circular na participated in by the executive branch," he added.

The senator pointed out that it's a different case with confidential funds wherein a report is submitted to COA, the Senate's President's Office, and the Office of the House Speaker.

"Ang rules ng intel funds iba, and yet granted siya and then he (OP) submits a report to himself. Bagsak, sirang sira ang concept of checks and balances and controls (The rules with intelligence funds is different yet it's granted and then he [OP] submits a report to himself. It's a blunder, the concept of checks and balances and controls is in disarray)," he said.

Pimentel added that he hopes they should look at the rationale behind the rules and how it was divided.

"If I could appeal to their strict legal aptitude of the people behind the OP, let us be consistent with the issuances that we have signed on. You are a civilian office huwag natin i-confuse yung nature natin na mayroon tayong intelligence fund (let's not confuse our nature that we have intelligence funds). Intel funds you monitor, huwag natin sirain yung controls, huwag mo bigyan ang sarili mo (let's not destroy the controls, don't give funds to yourself)," he stated.

He said that there may be activist lawyers listening and can file a case with the Supreme Court (SC) to test the legality of the grant of intelligence funds to the OP which is a civilian agency.

Meanwhile, Senate President Juan Miguel "Migz" Zubiri stated that the CIF report of the OP is one of the most detailed and comprehensive reports that he has seen.