CASE DIGEST: Belgica v.
Executive
Secretary (G.R. Nos. 208566, 208493 and
209251, 2013)
I. SUBSTANTIVE ISSUES
A. Congressional Pork Barrel
WON the 2013 PDAF Article and all other Congressional Pork Barrel Laws similar to it are
unconstitutional considering that they violate the principles of/constitutional provisions
on
1.) separation of powers
2.) non-delegability of legislative power
3.) checks and balances
4.) accountability
5.) political dynasties
6.) local autonomy
B. Substantive Issues on the Presidential Pork Barrel
WON the phrases:
(a) and for such other purposes as may be hereafter directed by the President
under Section 8 of PD 910 relating to the Malampaya Funds, and
(b) to finance the priority infrastructure development projects and to finance the
restoration of damaged or destroyed facilities due to calamities, as may be directed and
authorized by the Office of the President of the Philippines under Section 12 of PD
1869, as amended by PD 1993, relating to the Presidential Social Fund, are
unconstitutional insofar as they constitute undue delegations of legislative power
* HELD AND RATIO:
A. Congressional Pork Barrel
1.) YES. At its core, legislators have been consistently accorded post-enactment
authority (a) to identify the projects they desire to be funded through various
Congressional Pork Barrel allocations; (b) and in the areas of fund release and
realignment. Thus, legislators have been, in one form or another, authorized to
participate in the various operational aspects of budgeting, violating the separation of
powers principle. That the said authority is treated as merely recommendatory in nature
does not alter its unconstitutional tenor since the prohibition covers any role in
the implementation or enforcement of the law. Informal practices, through
which legislators have effectively intruded into the proper phases of budget execution,
must be deemed as acts of grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of
jurisdiction and, hence, accorded the same unconstitutional treatment.
2.) YES. The 2013 PDAF Article violates the principle of non-delegability since
legislators are effectively allowed to individually exercise the power of appropriation,
which, as settled in Philconsa, is lodged in Congress.
3.) YES. Under the 2013 PDAF Article, the amount of P24.79 Billion only appears as a
collective allocation limit. Legislators make intermediate appropriations of the PDAF only
after the GAA is passed and hence, outside of the law. Thus, actual items of PDAF
appropriation would not have been written into the General Appropriations Bill and are
thus put into effect without veto consideration. This kind of lump-sum/post-enactment
legislative identification budgeting system fosters the creation of a budget within a
budget which subverts the prescribed procedure of presentment and consequently
impairs the Presidents power of item veto. As petitioners aptly point out, the President
is forced to decide between (a) accepting the entire P24. 79 Billion PDAF allocation
without knowing the specific projects of the legislators, which may or may not be
consistent with his national agenda and (b) rejecting the whole PDAF to the detriment of
all other legislators with legitimate projects.
Even without its post-enactment legislative identification feature, the 2013 PDAF Article
would remain constitutionally flawed since the lump-sum amount of P24.79 Billion would
be treated as a mere funding source allotted for multiple purposes of spending (i.e.
scholarships, medical missions, assistance to indigents, preservation of historical
materials, construction of roads, flood control, etc). This setup connotes that the
appropriation law leaves the actual amounts and purposes of the appropriation for
further determination and, therefore, does not readily indicate a discernible item which
may be subject to the Presidents power of item veto.
4.) YES. To a certain extent, the conduct of oversight would be tainted as said
legislators, who are vested with post-enactment authority, would, in effect, be checking
on activities in which they themselves participate. Also, this very same concept of postenactment authorization runs afoul of Section 14, Article VI of the 1987 Constitution
which provides that: [A Senator or Member of the House of Representatives] shall not
intervene in any matter before any office of the Government for his pecuniary benefit or
where he may be called upon to act on account of his office. Allowing legislators to
intervene in the various phases of project implementation renders them susceptible to
taking undue advantage of their own office.
However, the same post-enactment authority and/or the individual legislators control of
his PDAF per se would allow him to perpetrate himself in office. This is a matter which
must be analyzed based on particular facts and on a case-to-case basis.
Also, while it is possible that the close operational proximity between legislators and the
Executive department, through the formers post-enactment participation, may affect
the process of impeachment, this matter largely borders on the domain of politics and
does not strictly concern the Pork Barrel Systems intrinsic constitutionality. As such, it is
an improper subject of judicial assessment.
5.) NO. Section 26, Article II of the 1987 Constitution is considered as not self-executing
due to the qualifying phrase as may be defined by law. Therefore, since there appears
to be no standing law which crystallizes the policy on political dynasties for
enforcement, the Court must defer from ruling on this issue. In any event, the abovestated argument on this score is largely speculative since it has not been properly
demonstrated how the Pork Barrel System would be able to propagate political
dynasties.
6.) YES. The Court, however, finds an inherent defect in the system which actually
belies the avowed intention of making equal the unequal. The gauge of PDAF and CDF
allocation/division is based solely on the fact of office, without taking into account the
specific interests and peculiarities of the district the legislator represents. As a result, a
district representative of a highly-urbanized metropolis gets the same amount of
funding as a district representative of a far-flung rural province which would be
relatively underdeveloped compared to the former. To add, what rouses graver
scrutiny is that even Senators and Party-List Representatives and in some years, even
the Vice-President who do not represent any locality, receive funding from
the Congressional Pork Barrel as well.
The Court also observes that this concept of legislator control underlying the CDF and
PDAF conflicts with the functions of the various Local Development Councils
(LDCs), instrumentalities whose functions are essentially geared towards managing local
affairs. The programs, policies and resolutions of LDCs should not be overridden nor
duplicated by individual legislators, who are national officers that have no law-making
authority except only when acting as a body.
C. Presidential Pork Barrel
YES. Regarding the Malampaya Fund: The phrase and for such other purposes as
may be hereafter directed by the President under Section 8 of PD 910 constitutes an
undue delegation of legislative power as it does not lay down a sufficient standard
to adequately determine the limits of the Presidents authority with respect to the
purpose for which the Malampaya Funds may be used. As it reads, the said phrase gives
the President wide latitude to use the Malampaya Funds for any other purpose he may
direct and, in effect, allows him to unilaterally appropriate public funds beyond the
purview of the law.
Regarding the Presidential Social Fund: Section 12 of PD 1869, as amended by PD
1993, indicates that the Presidential Social Fund may be used to finance the
priority infrastructure development projects. This gives him carte blanche authority to
use the same fund for any infrastructure project he may so determine as a priority.
The law does not supply a definition of priority infrastructure development
projects and hence, leaves the President without any guideline to construe the same.
To note, the delimitation of a project as one of infrastructure is too broad of
a classification since the said term could pertain to any kind of facility. Thus, the phrase
to finance the priority infrastructure development projects must be stricken down as
unconstitutional since similar to Section 8 of PD 910 it lies independently unfettered
by any sufficient standard of the delegating law.
