Ahead of the House vote on the second impeachment case of Sara Duterte earlier this year, the National Unity Party called on the House majority not to retaliate against lawmakers who will not support their battle against the Vice President.

That appeal appears to have fallen on deaf ears, going by the proposed 2027 national budget.

Rappler’s analysis of public works funding allocations for congressional districts, based on aggregated data from People’s Budget Coalition and BetterGov.PH, indicate that congressmen who didn’t take a stand against the Vice President tended to receive smaller budgets for the upcoming fiscal year.

Must Read

How to track insertions in House-approved 2027 budget

Small slice of the pie

Our review found that 28 out of 36 district lawmakers who did not vote to impeach the veep are poised to receive no more than P300 million each in Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) project funding for 2027.

From this number, 13 cast a no vote on Duterte’s impeachment. They include father-and-son Paolo and Omar Duterte, Southern Leyte 1st District Representative and Duterte-era public works chief Roger Mercado, and a handful of Mindanaoan lawmakers, such as Dal Corvera of Agusan del Norte, Laarni Roque of Bukidnon, Isidro Ungab of Davao City, and Nelson Dayanghirang of Davao Oriental.

Two specifically voted to abstain, namely Steve Solon of Sarangani and Audrey Zubiri of Bukidnon. Zubiri is the wife of current Senate Majority Leader Miguel Zubiri, who is seen by analysts as likely to vote in favor of Duterte’s conviction at the Senate.

Another 13 lawmakers did not vote at all. In Congress, legislators caught between opposing camps during contentious proceedings sometimes skip plenary sessions altogether, allowing them to avoid taking a position that could alienate either side.

A trio of lawmakers from Rizal who were absent during the vote — Jose Arturo Garcia, Tom Hernandez, and Emigdio Tanjuatco — are set to receive only P163 million for their shared engineering office in the proposed 2027 budget.

Even Deputy Speaker Kristine Meehan-Singson, despite her leadership role, had to deal with a smaller budget for her district. The Ilocos Sur congresswoman also skipped the May vote on Duterte’s impeachment.

Chump change

At the bottom of the list is the engineering office that serves Davao City 2nd District Representative Omar Duterte, which received a measly P4.2 million in infrastructure funding for 2027.

The younger Duterte is the grandson of former president Rodrigo Duterte and son of incumbent Davao City 1st District Representative Paolo Duterte, whose engineering office received the third lowest public works budget at P5.2 million.

The two Dutertes are often either absent or non-participating members during key House deliberations, but took the time to cast their no vote to the impeachment of the Vice President.

It is important to note that the figures could be higher. The budget watchdogs’ computation is still conservative, taking into account only projects handled by district engineering offices.

In reality, the budget for some public works projects is sourced from the regional or central office of DPWH. Lawmakers do not necessarily have control over all of these projects.

House prosecutors’ share

Some engineering offices serving the districts of lawmakers tapped to prosecute the Vice President at her impeachment trial fared better in the 2027 budget.

Most notably, the district engineering office that lead prosecutor Jinky Luistro shares with another Batangas congresswoman is poised to receive at least P3.1 billion in public works funds for 2027, putting her in the top 20.

The engineering offices associated with the districts of prosecutors Joel Chua and Bel Zamora are also getting more than a billion pesos in funding each, while lawmakers Lorenz Defensor, Lordan Suan, and Kaka Bag-ao’s associated engineering offices are poised to receive more than half a billion pesos in infrastructure funds.

In Congress, where patronage politics runs deep, it is not unusual for allies of the administration to get a bigger slice of the pie. In fact, the top beneficiaries of public works funds in the 2027 budget, based on the watchdogs’ computation, include Sandro Marcos, Speaker Bojie Dy, and appropriations chair Mika Suansing.

But the House has attracted growing scrutiny over its supposed failure to make the budget process in the lower chamber transparent, and to properly explain billions of pesos in adjustments it made in the President’s National Expenditure Program through the House spending bill.

The finding also comes on the heels of the Vice President’s concerns that the 2027 budget could be weaponized to pressure senator-judges into voting a certain way in her trial. Senator-judges have already pushed back against the allegation. – Rappler.com