Arroyo’s unfulfilled promises in Congress speech

MANILA, Philippines – With just eight months in office and with huge budget cuts in the 2010 appropriations, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo may step down next year without completing all the infrastructure projects that she promised to deliver to the country in her State of the Nation Address (Sona), according to the think-tank group of the House of Representatives.

In its budget briefer, the Congressional Planning and Budget Department (CPBD) said that out of the 149 projects, only 39 were officially completed, 21 of which were ports.

It says that 67 are on-going projects and 43 are still in pre-civil works. Of the on-going projects, 23 are roads and bridges and 21 are airports. Much of the projects on power and electrification are still undergoing pre-civil works.

“Given the status of the Sona infrastructure projects, it may be unlikely that these projects will be completed before the Arroyo term ends,” CPBD said.

“Subsequently, it is hard to attribute the decline in infrastructure spending for 2010 to the completion of Sona infrastructure projects. A huge cut could mean that some infrastructure projects may be left unfinished or that no new projects were introduced to give way to previous commitments,” it added.

Malacañang has proposed a P1.54-trillion budget for 2010, or eight percent higher than this year’s budget. But the proposed appropriation “was generally intended only to finance increases in interest payments and salary adjustments due to the implementation of the Salary Standardization Law III.”

According to CPBD, interest payments will increase by P88.2 billion to P340.8 billion, while Miscellaneous Personnel Benefits Fund will grow by about P49 billion to P76.5 billion.

Capital Outlay, however, will decline by 23.9 percent or some P52.8 billion. Capital outlay includes infrastructure and allocations for new buildings and other long term assets including equipment.

“A huge cut in public infrastructure outlay may be a cause for concern especially as the country’s infrastructure competitiveness rating is low and the status of the 149 SONA infrastructure projects shows there are still many uncompleted projects,” CBPD said.