Budget Watch

Senate OKs bill extending 2021 budget validity until end-2022

Mara Cepeda

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Senate OKs bill extending 2021 budget validity until end-2022

SENATE SESSION. Senate President Vicente Sotto III leads the marathon hybrid session on the proposed 2022 national budget, November 22, 2021.

Bibo Nueva Espau00f1a/Senate PRIB

The P4.5-trillion national budget for 2021 is originally set to expire by December 31

MANILA, Philippines – Senators approved a bill that would extend the shelf life of the P4.5-trillion national budget for 2021 until December 31, 2022.

Voting 22-0-0 on Monday, December 13, the Senate approved on third and final reading its amended version of House Bill (HB) No. 10373, which was earlier passed by the lower chamber in November. 

Under the 2021 General Appropriations Act (GAA), the P4.5-trillion budget for the year will expire by December 31. Any unspent funds by this date would have to be reverted to the National Treasury. 

This is because the Philippines observes a cash-based budgeting system, which requires government agencies to spend all their allotments within the fiscal year, or else have them revert to the National Treasury by the end of the term.

But if HB 10373 is passed into law, President Rodrigo Duterte’s government would have one more year to use the funds allocated for maintenance and other operating expenses and for capital outlay under the 2021 budget. 

Statutory shares of local government units in the current national budget would also be available for release, obligation, and disbursement “until appropriations are fully utilized and funds fully disbursed.”

Construction of infrastructure projects funded under the 2021 budget would also continue until December 2022. 

The budget validity extension, however, would not cover the funds for personnel services, so this will still expire by the end of 2021.

The P4.5-trillion GAA was the first pandemic-era national budget signed by Duterte. But the President has been drawing flak for his budget priorities, with high allocations for infrastructure and his controversial anti-insurgency task force amid the COVID-19 crisis. – Rappler.com

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Mara Cepeda

Mara Cepeda specializes in stories about politics and local governance. She covers the Office of the Vice President, the Senate, and the Philippine opposition. She is a 2021 fellow of the Asia Journalism Fellowship and the Reham al-Farra Memorial Journalism Fellowship of the UN. Got tips? Email her at mara.cepeda@rappler.com or tweet @maracepeda.