Sitting inside the Pacific Ring of Fire, the Philippines is no stranger to disasters. But these past few months, it has been rocked by a different kind of disaster: corruption.
The flooding of most of the nation revealed the systemic corruption that had been eating away at the nation’s coffers. This has led to Senate and House probes and even to the formation of the Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI). But the question of the eradication of corruption and budget misappropriation still exists. The solution the solons are eyeing right now? Blockchain.
House and Senate Bills
In a recent Senate hearing last Thursday, Oct. 2, 2025, by the committee on Science and Technology, headed by Senator Bam Aquino, the use of blockchain in ensuring transparency in the national budget took front and center, pushing for the passage of the Philippine National Budget Blockchain Act (Senate Bill 1330). The bill seeks to make the national budget (allocations, disbursements, procurements, and expenditures) more transparent and recorded in real time using a blockchain system.
Solons advancing SB1330 believe that it would reduce tampering of records and make the records for national budgets more accessible to every Juan.
In the House of Representatives, Rep. Javi Benitez and Rep. Brian Daniel Poe-Llamanzares have proposed House Bills 4380 and 4489, respectively. Both bills propose the use of blockchains in ensuring the transparency of the national budget.
Digital Ledgers in PH Agencies
While the bills are brewing in both chambers, two government agencies have already taken the leap of faith. Last Sept. 30, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), in a move to restore the public’s trust in this maligned agency, signed a memorandum of agreement with the Blockchain Council of the Philippines. This landmark deal launches the Integrity Chain where the public can track the agency’s projects—from budget release to completion.
On the other hand, the Department of Budget and Management is currently making use of blockchain in the agency’s budget release systems to make it more accessible to the public through the portal blockchain.dbm.gov.ph.
The pitfall
While blockchain seems to be a promising tool to clean up the system, at its heart, it’s still a tool. And tools are always up to the one wielding them. And there will always be gaps it can’t fully fill, and it’s with these cracks where devilry happens.
As Art Samaniego Jr. points out in his article in Techwatchph.com, “Blockchain is blind to truth. It preserves what’s entered, but cannot verify whether it’s honest.” So unless the watchdog and monitoring body ensure the trustworthiness and incorruptibility of the records, clouds of doubt will always hover over the effectiveness of blockchain as a tool for good governance.
Blockchain, Samaniego Jr. believes, “can be used for transparency. It can also be used as political cover, a shiny buzzword to distract from the fact that the old problems remain.”
Still a shiny promise
Bottom line, blockchain is merely a tool—new, shiny, and unfamiliar to the average Pinoy. But in a nation that has been infested with trapos and buwayas, it holds a promise of transparency, honesty and security, especially when it comes to the matter of the national budget. As Sen. Aquino said, “Sa blockchain, bawat piso ng taumbayan [ay] mababantayan.”
So let’s not be wary of it. But let’s not be complacent either. Rather, let’s approach it with the right amount of optimism and wariness.