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BY PRINCE GOLEZ
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Thursday, March 30, 2017
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MANILA – If the lack of budget this year — and next year — is any indication, the only island region in the country no longer exists, according to Department of Budget and Management secretary Benjamin Diokno.
“NIR is deemed abolished,” Diokno disclosed to Panay News late Tuesday night. “It has no budget for this year. It will have no budget next year.”
If Diokno were to be believed, President Rodrigo Duterte already decided to abolish the NIR before the 2017 budget was submitted to Congress.
“Subsequently, the matter was presented in a Cabinet meeting sometime last year. The Cabinet reaffirmed the President’s decision,” he said. “Last December, Congress passed the 2017 budget with zero appropriation for NIR.”
Panay News reached Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella and Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo for further comment but both were clueless on developments on the island region.
“I don’t know about that,” Panelo said. “Mahirap mag-comment. ’Di ko alam ’yon.” Abella said, “Waay pa ako sang balita.”
Diokno’s definitive statements were contrary to claims from Negros Island Region supporters that many Cabinet members wanted to keep the NIR.
“We have been told by Secretary (Ismael) Sueno (Interior department) and other Cabinet officials that we do have reasonably good support for NIR even at the Cabinet level,” former Negros Occidental governor and capitol consultant Rafael Coscolluela said during a visit in Iloilo City.
Aside from “most” of Duterte’s Cabinet members, many Negrenses outside of the island region were also supportive of NIR’s retention, Negros Occidental governor Alfredo Marañon Jr. told the press in January.
Oct. 11 last year Diokno claimed Duterte was set to sign an executive order (EO) abolishing the island region. Keeping the NIR is “an expensive exercise” that would cost the government at least P19 billion, he stressed.
“It’s (draft EO) pending at the Office of the President,” Diokno then said. “Anyway, it will be signed any time soon.”
No such EO has been signed as of press time.
On May 29, 2015 then President Benigno Aquino III created Negros Island Region (Region 18) through EO No. 183, merging the provinces of Negros Occidental and Negros Oriental, which were previously part of Western Visayas and Central Visayas, respectively.
Early this month Diokno also questioned the constitutionality of the island region. He claimed the Negros Island cannot be considered a region as it comprises only two provinces instead of three.
However, the issues on budget and constitutionality “stand on very weak grounds, in our opinion,” Coscolluela said. “Apparently, this is the same sentiment of many members of the Cabinet.”
December last year Sueno said he asked Duterte to retain the NIR and pointed out the benefits of a one-island region. The Interior secretary hoped the President would support funding for the NIR.
But “no money can be paid out of the Treasury except in pursuance of an appropriation authorized by Congress,” Diokno said on Tuesday, citing the Constitution.
October last year, he also said: “You don’t want to spend P19 billion for such two-province region. In any event, with the federalism, that region will not be created, parang useless iyon.”/PN
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