Gov’t spending for intelligence in 2017 rose by whopping 102%

From Malay Business Insight (Oct 29): Gov’t spending for intelligence in 2017 rose by whopping 102%                

THE national government’s “confidential, intelligence, and extraordinary expenses (CIE)” in 2017 rose by a whopping 101.78 percent to P8.98 billion compared to P4.52 billion in 2016.

Broken down by departments or offices, the top three spenders were the Office of the President with P2.515 billion, National Defense with P2.222 billion, and the Congress of the Philippines with P1.797 billion.

Combined, these three offices accounted for 72.87 percent of the total amount spent on confidential and intelligence activities by the government last year.

The OP’s share accounted for 28.05 percent, that of National Defense, 24.78 percent, and Congress, 20.04 percent.

The remaining 27.13 percent was apportioned among the rest of the agencies in government – Interior and Local Government (P883.462 million), other executive offices (P434.716 million), Justice (P346.372 million), The Judiciary (P236.898 million), Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (P104.502 million), Finance (P77.243 million), Education (P47.643 million), and Other Departments and Offices (P301.632 million).

By classification of expenditure Intelligence Expenses had the biggest slice of last year’s CIE pie with P4.403 billion, up 303 percent from just P1.093 billion in 2016.

Extraordinary and Miscellaneous expenses saw only a slight uptick to P2.566 billion in 2017 from P2.548 billion the year before.

Confidential expenses accounted for P1.998 billion up 1.49 percent from P803.353 million in 2016.

The figures were summarized in the 706-page 2017 Annual Financial Report released by the Commission on Audit last October 25.

Copies of the same report were earlier submitted to the Office of the President, the Senate, and the Lower House on September 25, 2018.

A review of the Office of the President’s CIE expenses year on year showed a huge increase in 2017, the first full year of the Duterte administration.

In 2015, the last full year of the previous administration, CIE expenditure totaled P453.592 million. This went up to P715.231 million in 2016 before nearly increasing three-fold to P2.515 billion in 2017.

Neither the 2016 nor the 2017 Financial Statements of the OP’s financial audits contained any explanation for the increases.

The General Headquarters-Armed Forces of the Philippines showed from only P152.648 million in 2016, its total CIE expenses ballooned to 1.682 billion in 2017 or a jump of 1,001 percent.

“The significant increase in the intelligence expense of Central Office was due to the massive/extensive intelligence and counter intelligence activities of the AFP during the Marawi crisis,” according to the explanation provided under the agency’s 2017 Financial Statement.

On the part of the Department of National Defense, the spending for the same purpose hardly moved from P35.939 million in 2016 to P36.028 million in 2017.

The House of Representatives listed only Extraordinary and Miscellaneous expenses totaling P1.523 billion in 2017, up only a tad from 2016’s P1.469 billion.

On the other hand, the Senate’s CIE expense in 2017 actually went down to P260.135 million compared to P298.01 million in 2016.

For the Philippine National Police (PNP), the Confidential, Intelligence and Extraordinary expenses increased by 235 percent from P252.55 million in 2016 to P845.51 million last year, attributed to the government’s ongoing war on drugs.

“Notable increase in this account was due to approved additional Intelligence Fund on top of regular intelligence fund received by the PNP from previous years and Intel Fund for PNP Anti-Illegal Drugs Campaign Plan (Double Barrel),” the agency clarified in its Financial Statement.

http://www.malaya.com.ph/business-news/news/gov%E2%80%99t-spending-intelligence-2017-rose-whopping-102