LMP-Luzon head defends PNoy, claims DAP beneficial to LGUs

By Sheen Crisologo

PENARANDA, Nueva Ecija — While President Aquino refrained from pressing his argument for the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) in his fifth State-Of-the-Nation Address (SONA) last Monday, the League of Municipalities of the Philippines (LMP) president in Luzon said it was a beneficial spending maneuver for local government units.

Mayor Ferdinand Abesamis, who heads the 699-member Luzon cluster of the LMP, said the DAP has proven beneficial to LGUs in the country, triggering pockets of inclusive growth in the countryside.

Notwithstanding the fact that parts of the DAP have discredited Malacañang’s appropriation of government savings, Abesamis dismissed speculations of an impending constitutional crisis because of Aquino’s move to challenge the Supreme Court’s (SC’s) declaration of the DAP as unconstitutional.

Abesamis, also president of the 27-member Nueva Ecija chapter of the LMP, defended the DAP, saying it helped fuel inclusive growth in the countryside.

He cited how the DAP enabled lowly LGUs — fourth to sixth class municipalities which are dependent on their internal revenue allotment (IRA) and mired in loans — to implement projects beneficial to common folk such as the Department of the Interior and Local Government’s (DILG’s) bottom-up budgeting (BUB) scheme.

“Here in my town, for example which is a fourth class town, we were IRA-dependent and were in the process of paying our loans. Here comes the DAP through the BUB,” he said.

The scheme bankrolled P15 million worth of projects in health and education which were identified and selected by civil society groups, non-government organizations and people’s organizations, Abesamis said.

“I fully support DAP because it was a tremendous help to my town, my constituents and also in my governance because I have additional resources to attend to the needs of our people,” he said.

He said it was no small wonder that his counterparts in the 698 other municipal LGUs crossed party lines in support of Aquino because the DAP helped them undertake projects in their respective localities.

Abesamis, who belongs to a family of lawyers led by their patriarch, retired Court of Appeals Justice Bernardo Abesamis, said he could not understand the claim of critics that the President’s criticism of the SC could create a constitutional crisis.

“I don’t think it (constitutional crisis) will happen.  In the first place, how can there be when President Aquino himself assured that he would abide by the High Court ruling?” he said.