Aid effectiveness in the context of the Philippines: a view from the House of Representatives

By Rep. Teddy Casiño (Bayan Muna)
Member, Congressional Oversight Committee on ODA

(Speech delivered before the Philippine Consultation on Civil Society Organizations and Aid Effectiveness on July 18, 2008 at the Richmond Hotel, 21 San Miguel Avenue, Ortigas Center, Pasig City)


I speak to you today in behalf of Rep. Exequiel Javier, co-chairperson for the House of the Congressional Oversight Committee on Official Development Assisstance or COCODA, who sends his regrets for not making it to today’s conference. The COCODA is a joint Senate-House body composed of the Chairmen of the Committee on Ways and Means of both the Senate and House of Representatives, five (5) members each from the Senate and the House representing the majority and two (2) members each from the Senate and the House representing the minority, that’s me.

In behalf of Congressman Javier and the COCODA, let me thank the organizers of this conference for inviting us to give our views on aid effectiveness. This gathering could not have been more timely, and I think is long overdue. In the past year, there has been a renewed interest in the halls of Congress on the issue of ODA due to various controversies hounding multi-billion ODA projects from the Chinese government. Although the issues have revolved around tong-pats and other anomalies, this has opened the doors for the discussions of other ODA-related issues, including those of aid effectiveness, ownership, conditionalities and the like.

Members of Congress are and should be concerned about the issue of aid effectiveness for the following reasons:

1. We are the ones who craft the national budget, including allocations for the local counterpart of ODA-funded projects and for the payment of ODA loans. As such, we have to make sure that the money we appropriate is spent well;
2. We are the ones who mainly craft national policy and have to ensure that ODA projects are in tune and support our national development goals;
3. ODA projects affect our constituents and we have the obligation to ensure that these projects meet not only their desired goals but the development needs of their intended beneficiaries and the national interest at large;
4. ODA projects are potential sources of high level corruption that have to be scrutinized by Congress as part of its oversight functions;

Because of this, Congress is a natural arena of engagement as far as aid effectiveness is concerned. The following legal instruments institutionalize this:

1. Article VI of the Constitution that spells out, among other things, Congress power over appropriations;
2. Article VII, Sec. 20 of the Constitution which requires the Executive, through the Monetary Board, to submit a quarterly report to Congress on its decisions on applications for loans to be contracted or guaranteed by the Government or GOCC;
3. Sec. 5 of RA 4860 or the Foreign Borrowings Act of 1966 that requires the President to report, within 30 days of the every session, the amount and purpose of all loans including guarantees extended by the government;
4. Sec. 8(c) of RA 8182, as amended, also known as the ODA Law of 1996, creating the COCODA;
5. Sec. 10 of RA 8182 requiring the President to report to each member of Congress, 30 days after the opening of every session, the loans and grants incurred by the government under the ODA Law;
6. Rule 8 of the IRR of RA 8182 which requires the NEDA to report to Congress, before June 30 of every year, the outcome of the annual ODA Portfolio Review.

Given this mandate, how has Congress performed in so far as monitoring and ensuring aid effectiveness?

To answer that question, let me just share with you some observations.

One, would you believe that it took nine years after the enactment of the ODA Law before a meeting of the COCODA was actually convened? This happened in August 2005 and involved only the House contingent. As far as our counterpart in the Senate is concerned, our information is that they have yet to convene until now.

During the 13th Congress, the House COCODA conducted several briefings with NEDA, the DOF and the BSP in 2005 and 2006. It also organized a congressional mission to Japan to iron out some problems relating to unpaid taxes. That’s about it.

In the 14th Congress, it was only last March that the House COCODA held its first meeting. Earlier in February, concerned that the House was not doing anything about the anomalies afflicting Chinese ODA projects, I filed House Resolution No. 485 calling on the COCODA to convene immediately to review all ODA contracts and agreements and to fulfill its other functions. Until now, only the House contingent has met to be briefed by NEDA and the DOF. The joint Senate-House body has yet to be organized and convened 12 years after the passage of the law that created it.

It is one thing that only the House COCODA has been convened, late as it is. It is another thing that during these meetings, the issue of aid effectiveness as we understand it is hardly ever discussed. Oftentimes, discussions revolve around NEDA’s annual ODA Portfolio Review, which is focused on the completion of physical targets, the cause of delays, reasons for bottlenecks, and cost overruns. Hardly is there any mention on a projects actual impact on people’s livelihoods and incomes, their standards of living, the enjoyment of their human rights, the impact on the environment, public participation and other such issues of greater concern to the people. The Paris Declaration has never been mentioned in our meetings.

During budget deliberations, hardly anyone in Congress bothers to look at the ODA portfolio, mainly because it falls under automatic appropriations and so traditionally is never tinkered with by Congress. In fact last year, we tried to break tradition by transferring the allocation for interest payments from automatic appropriations to general appropriations and reducing it by P25.9 billion.

In that same section, we decreed that “No amount shall be used for the interest payments on debts which are challenged as fraudulent, wasteful and/or useless” and cited several ODA projects as examples.

We also required the BSP and DOF to submit to Congress quarterly reports not just of contracted or guaranteed loans, which they already do, but of actual foreign and domestic debt service payments, which they don’t.

Do you know what happened to our experiment? Simple: the President vetoed the entire provision lock, stock and barrel, invoking the Foreign Borrowings Act (RA 4860), the Budget Reform Decree (PD 1177), the Administrative Code of 1987 (E.O. 292), plus the constitutional guarantee on the non-impairment of contracts.

This just goes to show how big the work before us is. But here’s some good news. The present chairperson of the House COCODA, Rep. Javier, is committed to do things differently. Among his plans are the following:

1. Getting funding and setting up a permanent secretariat for COCODA;
2. On-site visits to assess ODA funded projects on the ground;
3. Conducting oversight not only on NEDA, DOF and BSP but all agencies that have big ODA portfolios; and
4. Encouraging congressmen to raise their concerns regarding ODA projects in their districts.

If you will notice, absent in this list is the engagement with civil society organizations and social movements advocating aid effectiveness. That’s the challenge I am posing for us here today.

Indeed, it is logical that Congress, specifically the COCODA, should be working hand in hand with AidWatch and other civil-society organizations on the matter of aid effectiveness. In fact, I hope our presence here today signals the start of such a partnership.

To be honest, I think Congress needs a shot in the arm, or maybe a knock on the head from groups like you for it to fulfill its various duties in so far as ODA and aid effectiveness is concerned. In fact, given the reality of Congress as a bastion of neoliberal thought, corruption and reactionary politics, the only way that it can be pushed to fulfill its job is if groups like those present here today can challenge it to live up to its mandate. And for that, you will need warm bodies in the streets as well as warm bodies in congressional hearings. The congressmen and senators will have to see, hear and feel the people’s concern on the ODA issue. I invite you, therefore, to engage us on the matter. Make us targets of your struggle.

Thank you very much. ###