ABS-CBN News Online Beta

Gibo: Give LGUs leeway in using funds for disaster management

By Leilani Chavez, abs-cbnNEWS.com | 10/06/2009 5:08 PM

Printer-friendly version | Send to friend | Share your views

MANILA - Defense Secretary Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr. on Tuesday said he would give local government units (LGUs) more flexibility in utilizing their funds so they could prepare for disasters more effectively, and avoid huge damages to lives and properties like what happened with the onslaught of Typhoon Ondoy.
 
Teodoro, whose defense post also makes him the chair of the National Disaster Coordination Council, recognized the need for LGUs to “guide” the national government—and not the other way around—on how best to respond to calamities.
 
“I am in full support [of the idea] that local government units take the lead. The most important is to give you the leeway to use more funds for capacity building,” Teodoro told mayors and governors during “Face to Face: 100 Local Government Champions vs 4 Presidential Contenders,” a forum held in Makati City.
 
With the damages in both lives and properties incurred during the wake of Ondoy and the string of monsoons hitting the country, Teodoro believes LGUs should have adequate disaster response measures in their own jurisdictions.
 
Best position

Local executives, he said, are also in the best position to determine the right preparations for possible disasters because they are more familiar with the needs of their localities.
 
“We [national government] have to rely on the different local government units to be our guide…and we have to rely on the state of your preparations,” he said.
 
Teodoro said the national government part, for its part, should support local disaster risk management efforts by “placing some sort of rational framework.” It should also provide basic national infrastructure that will allow easier access to communities.
 
Newsbreak  earlier reported that LGUs’ hands are tied by overly strict rules when it comes to utilizing their calamity funds. The result is that they can only use the fund for relief and rescue operations, or when calamities have already struck, and not for risk reduction and disaster management activities. 
 
IRA and pork barrel

Further, Teodoro said that he is amenable to the allocation of additional resources for LGUs, but the proposal to divide the internal revenue allotment (IRA) equally between the national and local governments should be studied further. The tax collection is currently split 60-40 in favor of the national government.
 
“In conscience I cannot give a definite answer because the national government needs it, too,” he said, citing the needs for bigger funds for the defense and education deparrments, and for social services.
 
When Puerto Princesa Mayor Edward Hagedorn asked if an equitable sharing of revenues from natural resources is possible under a Teodoro presidency, the aspirant said it would depend on the “impact of the asset to national interest.”
 
Teodoro, a former congressman of Tarlac, also said that he is in favor of maintaining pork barrel allocations for congressmen, as long as these are spent on prioritized projects.
 
“In my district it is a good thing. Sometimes it is an effective developmental tool as long as you have a prioritized list of what and what should not be done,” Teodoro said.
 
He said the pork should be used for major infrastructure projects like markets, farm-to-market roads, water systems, and the likes, and not for small roads and basketball courts.
 
He said local officials can guide their congressmen in using pork barrel funds for transportation, disaster preparedness efforts, and communication artilleries.
 
Disarmament

Asked by Mindanao local officials about his idea of achieving peace on the island, Teodoro said he believes that LGUs should help in the “honest to goodness” disarmament of all non-government armed groups in Mindanao.
 
He explained that the presence of armed groups is a bottleneck in achieving sustainable peace. As in cases of dialogues, there should be a “guarantee that…people will not end up shooting each other.”
 
“Let’s not be overly ambitious, the first step is genuine peace, physical peace which can be enforced by the national government and the local government,” Teodoro said.
 
He reasoned that the lack of uniformed men contributes to the inability to maintain peace in Mindanao. According to him, the country has 120,000 soldiers and 130,000 policemen, making it hard to maintain peace in certain areas.
 
“I will not pretend to have a Mindanao solution. Nobody can, I challenge anybody who can say they have the solution in Mindanao. What I know, if people remain to be armed and there is no presence of the state to deter, no solution will come out,” he said. (abs-cbnNEWS.com)