Health Groups Decry
‘Patronage Politics’
behind Withdrawal of DoH Last-Quarter Allotment
The P294-million remaining budget of the
Department of Health (DoH) for the last quarter of 2006 will be of great
use, but unfortunately not to the health department and its services.
Despite the intractable logistical matters and the great need for
resources that have been festering our public healthcare system, the
Department of Budget and Management (DBM) decided not to release the DoH
funds.
BY PHILIP PARAAN
Contributed to Bulatlat
The P294-million
($6.15 million based on a $1:P48.78 exchange rate) remaining budget of
the Department of Health (DoH) for the last quarter of 2006 will be of
great use, but unfortunately not to the health department and its
services.
Despite the
intractable logistical matters and the great need for resources that
have been festering our public healthcare system, the Department of
Budget and Management (DBM) decided not to release the DoH funds.
This was revealed
during a picket–dialogue between the protesting health workers last Jan.
29, which coincides with the deadline set by the DBM for all budget
requests before all of last year’s undisbursed appropriations goes back
to the national treasury.
To the Alliance of
Health Workers (AHW), a national organization of hospital workers’
unions, this is a case of DoH and DBM courting contempt of the
government’s own fiscal rules, referring to the fact that legislated
budget cannot just be withheld or diverted to any other use.
According to the
DoH, it did however filed a request to the DBM to obtain the funds
earlier last year and exhausted all procedural means to get hold of its
last quarter budget.
But health workers
now ask, “Where is the money?” Health workers were prompted to take
action regarding the missing budget not only because of the failure of
the DoH to provide work enhancement benefits, but, more importantly, the
amount could have been useful to health services, programs and other
operations where it is rightfully intended.
Unable to
adequately explain why the last quarter budget of the health department
was not released, the DoH officials, through Usec. Alexander Padilla of
DoH’s Legal Department, points to the DBM, however questionable and
arbitrary the basis were for the denial of the funds. The budget
department claims that the health sector had enough savings for the year
(2006) considering that it was still able to provide work enhancement
benefits to its hospital workers.
DoH Department
Order No.2006-0067 or the DoH Work Enhancement Benefit (WEB), which the
DBM said was one of the reasons the last quarter budget was withheld,
stipulated that each DoH employee was to receive P10,000 ($205) as
Christmas bonus, supposed to be paid in two installments in December 22
and 29 of last year. The WEB, according to the order, would come from
the current allotment and savings of government hospitals from its
cost-cutting schemes. It was not allotted from the budget or savings of
the DoH.
“The WEB is
double-standard and deceitful because most hospitals are overdraft and
under budgeted,” said Emma Manuel, president of the AHW in an earlier
interview. Furthermore, Manuel asserts that health services cannot be
subject to cost-cutting schemes considering that it is already under
funded and grossly inadequate.
Among the major
government hospitals in Metro Manila, hospital personnel from the Tondo
Medical Center, Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital, and the Research
Institute for Tropical Medicine did not receive anything, while those
from the Jose Reyes Memorial Medical Center, San Lazaro Hospital, and
the National Center for Mental Health received partial payments ranging
from P2,000 ($41) to P5,000 ($102.50).
While DoH officials
complain that this is an obvious case of infringement of official
functions between the two departments, the DoH further criticized the
DBM for interfering with its program implementation. Skeptical health
workers however believe that there is a seeming collusion between the
two departments.
Meanwhile sources
within the health department say that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
has promised to fund the rehabilitation of some districts hospitals in
the country as part of her commitment to local government units. If this
is so, the government would be contravening the principle and operation
of devolution. Since the devolution, maintenance of local health
facilities, including provincial and district hospitals no longer
becomes a DoH concern but that of the local governments.
For the AHW, this
episode reminds them of how in the election of 2004 funds from the
Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) were diverted to fund the
distribution of free Philhealth cards, a project current Health
Secretary Francisco Duque implemented himself when he was still
Philhealth president, to boost GMA’s election campaign.
The Health Alliance
for Democracy (HEAD), fears that the withheld funds might find its way
to the administration party’s campaign kitty. According to the
secretary-general of HEAD Dr. Gene Nisperos, the budget allocated to DoH
hospitals has not significantly changed over the last six years under
the Arroyo regime. The total budget of the 12 biggest DoH hospitals in
Metro Manila amounted to only P2.48 billion in 2001 ($48,636,987 based
on that year’s $1:P50.99 exchange rate). This became P2.55 billion in
2002 ($49.42 million based on a $1:P51.60 exchange rate), P2.61 billion
in 2003 ($48.15 million based on an exchange rate of $1:P54.20), P2.53
billion in 2004 ($45.15 million based on an exchange rate of
($1:P56.04), and back to P2.48 billion in 2006 ($50.84 million based on
a $1:P48.78 exchange rate). Bulatlat
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