(Eagle News) — President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday, April 11, said he would veto the entire 2019 budget bill if it was “talagang tagilid.”
Duterte issued the threat as he announced his legal office was still studying the bill passed by Congress last month after an impasse between the two houses.
Senators led by Senate President Tito Sotto had opposed the House-enrolled budget bill, saying it was no longer the Congress-ratified version because congressmen had made “alignments” even after the ratification.
But congressmen led by House appropriations chair Rolando Andaya Jr. said these were not alignments but mere “itemizations” that would make the budget bill easier to scrutinize.
In the end, Sotto signed the House-enrolled bill but “with strong reservations,” leaving it up to the President, whose signature is required for the budget bill to become law, to decide whether to veto the controversial provisions.
“Ngayon pagka talagang tagilid ‘yan, I will outright veto the entire budget,” Duterte said in a PDP-Laban sortie in Bacolod.
Earlier, Duterte had said he would not sign an “illegal document” but warned about what he said were the dangers of a reenacted budget.
The government has been operating on a reenacted budget in the absence of a national budget for 2019.
