TAXPAYERS paid P1.86 million on average for every project that was supposedly implemented using the pork barrel or Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) of 21 senators in the 15th Congress from June 2010 to June 2012.
What are the most expensive, and what, the cheapest, projects?
Browse through the Public Funds section of PCIJ’s MoneyPolitics Online to learn more about your legislators’ spending patterns.
The most expensive were those implemented under the “soft projects” category, such as cash assistance to indigent patients, scholarship, livelihood projects, and financial assistance to local government units (LGUs). The 953 “soft projects” rolled out during the period cost taxpayers P2.08 billion, or P2.18 million on average.
In contrast, infrastructure or “hard projects” implemented using pork money seemed to have cost less.
A total of 2,151 infrastructure projects were funded with P3.7 billion of the senators’ pork during the same period. On average, each hard project cost taxpayers P1.72 million. These projects include the construction and/or repair of roads and bridges, drainage and boulder bank protection, multi-purpose buildings and pavements, school buildings, and health centers.
Another P4.3 million, however, went to three other projects with no specifications at all.
In sum, the 21 senators used their combined P5.78-billion pork allocations on 3,107 pet projects from June 2010 to June 2012.
Two other senators, Joker P. Arroyo and Panfilo M. Lacson, did not avail themselves of their PDAF allocations. The 24th senator of the 15th Congress, Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, was elected President in May 2010.
Pork is the exclusive perk of legislators. But in December 2010, Vice President Jejomar ‘Jojo’ C. Binay asked Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile to allot PDAF shares to the Office of the Vice President.
President Aquino agreed and instructed the Senate to grant Binay P200 million in annual pork share, using the PDAF Aquino was supposed to receive as the 24th senator.
The 2011 General Appropriations Act (GAA) made only passing mention of Binay’s pork share in the paragraphs on “allocation of funds.”
In the 2012 GAA, however, Malacanang and Congress somehow put Binay’s pork in order — his P200-million pork allotment was enrolled in the budget of the Office of the Vice President.