GAG ORDER STILL IN EFFECT

APPROVAL of Dagupan’s proposed budget for 2012 could be delayed further after all department heads of the city hall were a no-show during the start of the hearings at the Sangguniang Panlungsod (SP) on January 17.

City Administrator Vladimir Mata, who was expected to read the budget message of Mayor Benjamin Lim before the council, was also not present.

Not one of the members of the Local Finance Committee (LFC) , composed of the chief of the City Planning and Development Office, the City Treasurer, and the City Budget Officer, appeared as well.

Mata, however, did send a letter to the SP through its secretary Rizalino Uson explaining the department heads’ absence citing “important and pressing matters that need to be attended to. “

He further asked the SP to specify which departments need to appear before the SP in the next hearing.

In a press statement issued Friday, Mata said “the department heads will surely appear” before the SP if the council can establish “a system” for their attendance and by being “specific and refrain from fishing for any information to economize time and assure that the city’s operations are not jeopardized.”

Vice Mayor Belen Fernandez, the SP presiding officer, however, referred to Mata’s explanation as ”nothing but an alibi” for the gag order since formal invitations had been sent as previously required by the office of the city mayor.

A department head confirmed this in a subsequent TV interview that department heads did not show up because they were waiting for an order from the mayor to attend.

Fernandez pointed out that department heads have been snubbing invitations by the SP, coursed through the mayor’s office, to appear before the council after the October 7, 2011 memorandum of Lim ordering them not to attend any session or committee hearing of the SP without any authorization from his office.

Some of the past invitations were on other matters not related to the budget.

Fernandez cited the non-appearance of the Tourism Officer and the City Engineer during an inquiry on the river cruise project that was constructed without any budget appropriation by the SP and with no public bidding for the project., as one example

LFC A MUST

Fernandez, head of the committee of the whole conducting the budget hearing, reset the next hearing to January 24.

Meanwhile, Councilor Jeslito Seen, chairman of finance committee, said the Budget Operations Manual that sets the sequences of the budget deliberation, requires the presence of the members of the LFC, a fact that the executive department knows.

Seen also noted that the executive department has not submitted a copy of the Gender and Development Plan (GAD) and the Risk Reduction Management Plan (RRMP), which are required components of the budget submission.

While Mata, in his letter to the SP, said the GAD Plan as well as RRMP were already incorporated in the proposed P581 budget submitted to the SP in October, Seen stressed that what was submitted was a budget for GAD and not the plan itself, which is what the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) requires.

Last year, the DBM returned Dagupan’s approved budget because it did not submit the GAD plan.

In a statement, Mata said the RRMP is “beyond the (SP) turf.”

Further, Seen said city hall has not submitted the trial balance for 2011 that details the expenses of the city for the year against its income.

The councilor also maintained that the SP cannot approve the budget unless the department heads attend the hearing to answer queries by the SP members.

Communication by letter, he added, is not sufficient.

“Pupuede bang sumagot ang papel kung tatanungin namin?” he asked.

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