After having gained experience in budget execution over the past four and half years, which is a lifetime in public administration, agencies can no longer invoke “kulang sa praktis” when it comes to spending for things the people have paid for with taxes. 

It is but fair to expect that they have mastered the art of expeditious spending. That the underspending, low spending, and no spending of the past five fiscal years are already things of the past. 

It is actually the people who paid the tuition for their long learning curve. Budget delayed is development denied. An unbuilt hospital is treatment of the sick postponed and an unfinished schoolbuilding is education put on hold. 

The need for on time, on-budget, on-target spending is made urgent by the pandemic. The saying that the virus must be faster than the bureaucracy specifically applies on the speed funds travel from the treasury to the people. Rebooting a stalled economy calls for recharged spending. Ang kailangan ng Pilipinas sa susunod na taon ay Operation Warp Speed sa public spending. 

The budget is nothing but promises compiled in a thick wad of newsprint if what it authorizes are not implemented for the people’s benefit. 

This failure to spend appropriations on time is the culprit behind the “parking of funds” in other agencies. It is a recourse to meet the fund’s expiry date and artificially prolong its validity. To escape being returned to the treasury, these funds seek asylum in these agencies, where they assume the status of funds already obligated.

On paper, national government agencies were able to disburse only 68 percent of their appropriations in 2017, 77 percent in 2018 and 82 percent in 2019.