The digital age has made people accustomed to real-time developments. Why not apply this to how government spends their taxes?

Calling transparency a necessary safeguard against corruption, Bagong Henerasyon (BH) Party-list Rep. Robert Nazal has filed a bill mandating full and real-time disclosure of government expenditures through a unified digital platform.

House Bill (HB) No. 6792, or the proposed Citizen Access and Disclosure of Expenditures for National Accountability (CADENA) Act, requires all branches of government to publish budget, procurement, fund release and audit data in a single, publicly accessible system that allows citizens to track the flow of public funds.

The filing of the measure follows the recent declaration of President Marcos backing the institutionalization of CADENA as a transparency reform.

“Public funds belong to the Filipino people. The people have the right to know, in clear and verifiable terms, how their money is planned, awarded, spent, and audited—without obstacles, delays, or hidden gaps,” Nazal said in the bill’s explanatory note.

According to Nazal, the CADENA bill addresses long-standing transparency gaps caused by fragmented disclosures and outdated systems.

“Across agencies and levels of government, citizens continue to face barriers in accessing essential budget, procurement, and audit information—gaps that compromise the people’s ability to monitor how their money is planned, obligated, disbursed, and ultimately spent,” said the member of the House minority bloc.

The measure mandates time-bound disclosure of key budget, procurement and audit documents in machine-readable formats, all hosted within Philippine jurisdiction.

Nazal warned that weak disclosure systems allow abuses to surface only after harm has been done.

“In the Philippines, these systemic gaps manifest in scattered disclosures, irregular posting of documents, and delays that allow irregularities to surface only after damage has already been done,” he said.

He says CADENA is designed to make transparency enforceable, not symbolic. “Without unified standards and verifiable technologies, transparency efforts remain symbolic rather than substantive."

The bill also creates a National Budget Transparency and Accountability Council to oversee implementation and enforce compliance.

“Unaddressed, these weaknesses heighten the risks of inefficiency, misuse of funds and corruption. They undermine public trust, weaken institutional accountability, and impede the public’s right to follow the flow of public money through the entire budget cycle,” the party-list solon said.

Nazal says the measure aligns with national development goals and international standards on fiscal openness.

“This measure is grounded in the belief that fiscal transparency is fundamental to a democracy’s capacity to safeguard public resources and uphold the people’s right to information,” he said.