Lawmakers challenge govt on dole, dismiss WB report

THE congressional allies of President Benigno Aquino III are headed for a clash today with Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman over when the government will end its multi-billion-peso dole program and how many recipients there should be.

The lawmakers, led by Negros Oriental Rep. Pryde Henry Teves, Batangas Rep. Mark Llandro Mendoza, and Agham Rep. Angelo Palmones say the handouts must stop by 2014, before the campaign period for the 2016 presidential elections begins, but Soliman says the administration plans to end the program a year later, or by 2015.

“We want Secretary Soliman to explain to us why we have to wait for 2015 to exit from the conditional cash transfer program,” Teves told the Manila Standard.

“The government might find it difficult to get out by then because it is already the campaign period, and the presidential aspirants would be put in an awkward situation where they would be forced to promise to continue the [dole] or they would automatically lose millions of votes, which was what happened in Mexico.”

Palmones said the number of recipients should be kept at the current 2.3 million, and that the budget be pegged to this year’s P21.9 billion. Soliman is seeking a P39.8-billion budget for 2012 and aims to increase the number of recipients to 5 million by 2015.

She will be facing the House committee on appropriations, led by Cavite Rep. Joseph Emilio Abaya, at 1:30 p.m. Monday to justify the increase in the dole program’s budget.

On Sunday, Teves and Palmones played down a World Bank report released by the Palace painting as a success the Latin American dole programs on which the Philippine program was patterned.

“That was expected,” Palmones said.

“It was the World Bank that formulated the CCT program for Latin American countries… Besides, the World Bank granted the loans to these countries, so naturally they would support it and say it is successful.

“Didn’t the World Bank grant $400 million in loans and the ADB some $405 million? Did the World Bank and ADB lose money? No, they earned interest. The point is, if we want to empower the poor, let’s give them decent jobs and a permanent income, and classrooms and teachers for school children.”

Teves said that if the poverty alleviation program was so successful in Mexico, why was it now on its 17th year when it was originally programmed for only five?

“Do we have the money to sustain the program without contracting foreign loans?” he said.

“We should teach our people to fish. I dread the day when, after 17 years, we are still fishing for them.”

But Soliman said she was confident that the lawmakers would see that the program “is working and has direct impact on uplifting the lives of the poorest of the poor.”

Based on the dole program documents furnished the Manila Standard, some 5.66 million children age zero to 14 were enrolled in the program with 2.3 million adults in as many households. The school children are required to attend school 85 percent of the time, or in the 10 months they are enrolled in the program.

Of the 2.3 million recipients, 2,040,258 were women and 171,797 were men, bringing the total to 2,212,055 as of July, Soliman said.

The figure would come to 2.3 million by the end of August, with the handouts being distributed to some 700,000 new recruits by September, she said.

“Almost half of the total registered household beneficiaries or around 48 percent are from Mindanao, while 30 percent and 22 percent are from Luzon and the Visayas,” Soliman told the Manila Standard.

Mindanao accounts for 1.068 million beneficiaries, Luzon 665,205, and the Visayas 478,404.

Soliman is also expected to face questioning over the number of people needed to administer the program. –Christine F. Herrera, Manila Standard Today