Oct 28, 2024 - 16:17
By manilatimes.net

Senate to scrutinize govt flood control program

SENATE President Francis Escudero said the government's flood control program would be scrutinized when the Senate begins next week its plenary debates on the proposed P6.352 trillion 2025 national budget.

With many areas devastated by Severe Tropical Storm Kristine, Escudero said it was certain the flood control budget would be a «hot topic» when the Senate takes up the proposed budgets of concerned agencies.

This includes the proposed appropriations of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), the Department of the Interior and Local Government, the Department of Social Welfare and Development, and the Department of National Defense-Office of Civil Defense.

Senate President Francis Escudero

The DPWH has a proposed flood control budget of P303 billion for next year, representing close to 34 percent of its total appropriations.

Escudero gave credit to President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for responding with higher budgets for flood mitigation.

«We should build for the next generation, not for the next elections,» he said in a statement.

«Moving forward, however, we will not only exact accountability but also make sure the 2025 budget will provide preventive measures to avoid a recurrence as well as adequate rehabilitation and response in case of a similar calamity in the future,» Escudero said.

He said flooding was not a modern-day phenomenon. «It has been with us long before the birth of the republic. Every administration has its own 'Great Flood' to contend with.»

The senator said that «geographical handicaps,» forest denudation and fiercer storms have all contributed to the problem of floods.

«Theoretically, rising seas and higher flood waters must lead to rising appropriations and a higher budget for climate adaptation, of which, I must emphasize, flood control is but one component,» he said.

«That's why the [national] budget of the Philippines is unique. Disaster is becoming a de facto macroeconomic assumption. That is a given in the world's most calamity-prone nation,» Escudero said.

In 2023, P291.2 billion out of the P1.46 trillion total infrastructure outlay, or 19.86 percent, went to flood control projects. This was increased