COMMISSION on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Juan Andres Bautista defended Thursday his proposed allocation of intelligence funds for their 2017 budget, which he said had also been granted to his predecessors.
He noted that asking for such allotment is not extraordinary, as former heads of the poll body have asked for it.
"All the past Comelec [chairmans] have requested and were granted confidential funds. Monsod, Abalos, Melo, and up to Brillantes. At ginamit nila 'yan. Also other constitutional commissions are granted confidential funds. The Ombudsman, the Commission on Audit, even the Commission on Human Rights are granted confidential funds," Bautista said in an interview.
He is reacting on the decision of the Commission en banc scrapping the P30 million intelligence fund from the 2017 proposed budget amounting to P4.6 billion.
Commissioner Rowena Guanzon explained that majority of the seven-man panel of the commission agreed to remove the said fund from their annual budget.
"En Banc passed a Resolution declaring that, as a matter of policy, the en banc will not request for a budget for confidential or intelligence funds," Guanzon said in a separate interview.
The poll body official added, "I gave them the opinion that this is unnecessary. And this confidential funds are just vulnerable to graft and corruption.”
On the other hand, the Comelec Finance Department said the P30 million “will be used for the surveillance activities and gathering of information relative to the activities of certain group of individuals and technology experts suspected of conducting overt and covert operations that may have direct bearing to the election cases/complaints filed with the Commission.”
Previously, the Comelec received intelligence and counter-intelligence funds ranging from P10 million to P30 million.
For the years 2007, 2011, and 2012, it was given P10 million each; while in 2008, P15 million has been allocated.
In 2009, the poll body has been given P20 million in intelligence funds and it got P30 million each in 2010 and 2013.
Bautista said he would have wanted to spend the intelligence fund for the prevention of another hacking incident.
"Hacking, you know, was a big problem. We noticed that we didn’t have the ability to make a quick response given the situation because there was no item in the budget that would have allowed us to really act on issues of how to get information. So it’s an issue of resources. That’s why we thought it would be for the commission’s interest if we reinstate a request for confidential funds," he said. (FP/Sunnex)