SAN FERNANDO CITY, La Union — Lawmakers have the obligation to provide funding for development projects being initiated by concerned national government agencies in rural areas to spur economic development, thus, they have to voluntarily allocate part of their pork barrel funds for the rehabilitation of areas devastated by the three typhoons that struck the country last month, Senator Pilar Juliana Cayetano said here Friday afternoon.

The lady senator said she supports the call of Public Works Secretary Victor Domingo for congressmen and senators to allocate 25 percent of their Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) next year for rehabilitation projects in order to restore the damaged government projects and facilities in the Ilocos and Cordillera regions the soonest possible time.

She also cited that the P60.5 missing funds from the Road Users Tax could have been enough to restore and rehabilitate the damages suffered by five regions due to the onslaught of storms “Ondoy”, “Pepeng”, “Ramil”, and “Santi”, thus, the efforts of the Senate to look for the missing funds should be supported in order for the people responsible for the misuse of the funds to be charged and brought to jail.

Congressmen are given P70 million each as pork barrel funds while senators are allotted P200 million each for their PDAF.

Cayetano assured his support to the snowballing efforts of Secretary Domingo to force lawmakers to pool their resources to generate at least P7 billion to jumpstart the rehabilitation of the heavily devastated areas.

She clarified that her support to the call of Secretary Domingo for them to sacrifice part of their pork barrel funds will not mean her change of heart for the Arroyo administration. She asserted that this is for the welfare of the people in the disaster-stricken areas, thus, there is no reason for congressmen and senators to deny such noble appeal.

However, Cayetano stressed what is important is to make sure that the pooled funds from the lawmakers will be closely monitored so that they could use the funds primarily for the rehabilitation of the damaged areas, especially in the Northern Luzon area.

Cayetano, chairman of the Senate Committee on Social Justice, claimed there is nothing wrong with Secretary Domingo’s appeal to lawmakers since it concerns how the government will work on the immediate rehabilitation of the calamity-stricken areas of the country but it must be made clear that public funds should be safeguarded by the different sectors so that all projects being implemented will be properly done unlike what has happened to the misuse of the billions of pesos of road users tax.

Secretary Domingo said there are no funds to jumpstart the rehabilitation of damaged infrastructure in the different parts of Northern Luzon, thus, people will have to be patient enough in waiting for the restoration and rehabilitation of roads and bridges, thus, road cuts and temporary routes created to allow motorists to traverse will have to remain until the government could source out sufficient funds to implement rehabilitations projects.