[COMPREHENSIVE DIGEST] Belgica

v. Executive Secretary
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Click here for the full text of the Decision.
* FACTS:
In the Philippines, the pork barrel (a term of American-English origin) has been
commonly referred to as lump-sum, discretionary funds of Members of the Legislature
(Congressional Pork Barrel). However, it has also come to refer to certain funds to the
Executive. The Congressional Pork Barrel can be traced from Act 3044 (Public Works
Act of 1922), the Support for Local Development Projects during the Marcos period, the
Mindanao Development Fund and Visayas Development Fund and later the Countrywide
Development Fund (CDF) under the Corazon Aquino presidency, and the Priority
Development Assistance Fund under the Joseph Estrada administration, as continued by
the Gloria-Macapagal Arroyo and the present Benigno Aquino III administrations.
The Presidential Pork Barrel questioned by the petitioners include the Malampaya
Fund and the Presidential Social Fund. The Malampaya Fund was created as a special
fund under Section 8, Presidential Decree (PD) 910 by then-President Ferdinand
Marcos to help intensify, strengthen, and consolidate government efforts relating to the
exploration, exploitation, and development of indigenous energy resources vital to
economic growth. The Presidential Social Fund was created under Section 12, Title IV,
PD 1869 (1983) or the Charter of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation
(PAGCOR), as amended by PD 1993 issued in 1985. The Presidential Social Fund has
been described as a special funding facility managed and administered by the
Presidential Management Staff through which the President provides direct assistance to
priority programs and projects not funded under the regular budget. It is sourced from
the share of the government in the aggregate gross earnings of PAGCOR.
Over the years, pork funds have increased tremendously. In 1996, an anonymous
source later identified as former Marikina City Romeo Candazo revealed that huge sums
of government money went into the pockets of legislators as kickbacks. In 2004, several
citizens sought the nullification of the PDAF as enacted in the 2004 General
Appropriations Act for being unconstitutional, but the Supreme Court dismissed the
petition. In July 2013, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) began its probe into
allegations that the government has been defrauded of some P10 Billion over the past
10 years by a syndicate using funds from the pork barrel of lawmakers and various
government agencies for scores of ghost projects. The investigation was spawned by
sworn affidavits of six whistle-blowers who declared that JLN Corporation JLN
standing for Janet Lim Napoles had swindled billions of pesos from the public coffers
for ghost projects using no fewer than 20 dummy non-government organizations for
an entire decade. In August 2013, the Commission on Audit (CoA) released the results of
a three-year audit investigation covering the use of legislators PDAF from 2007 to 2009,
or during the last three (3) years of the Arroyo administration.
As for the Presidential Pork Barrel, whistle-blowers alleged that [a]t least P900 Million
from royalties in the operation of the Malampaya gas project intended for agrarian
reform beneficiaries has gone into a dummy [NGO].

* ISSUES:
A. Procedural Issues
1.) Whether or not (WON) the issues raised in the consolidated petitions involve an
actual and justiciable controversy
2.) WON the issues raised in the consolidated petitions are matters of policy subject to
judicial review
3.) WON petitioners have legal standing to sue
4.) WON the 1994 Decision of the Supreme Court (the Court) on Philippine Constitution
Association v. Enriquez (Philconsa) and the 2012 Decision of the Court on Lawyers
Against Monopoly and Poverty v. Secretary of Budget and Management (LAMP) bar the
re-litigation of the issue of constitutionality of the pork barrel system under the
principles of res judicata and stare decisis
B. Substantive Issues on the Congressional Pork Barrel
WON the 2013 PDAF Article and all other Congressional Pork Barrel Laws similar to it are
unconstitutional considering that they violate the principles of/constitutional provisions
on
1.) separation of powers
2.) non-delegability of legislative power
3.) checks and balances
4.) accountability
5.) political dynasties
6.) local autonomy
C. Substantive Issues on the Presidential Pork Barrel
WON the phrases:
(a) and for such other purposes as may be hereafter directed by the President
under Section 8 of PD 910 relating to the Malampaya Funds, and
(b) to finance the priority infrastructure development projects and to finance the
restoration of damaged or destroyed facilities due to calamities, as may be directed and
authorized by the Office of the President of the Philippines under Section 12 of PD
1869, as amended by PD 1993, relating to the Presidential Social Fund,
are unconstitutional insofar as they constitute undue delegations of legislative power
* HELD AND RATIO:
A. Procedural Issues
No question involving the constitutionality or validity of a law or governmental act
may be heard and decided by the Court unless there is compliance with

the legal requisites for judicial inquiry, namely: (a) there must be an actual case
or controversy calling for the exercise of judicial power; (b) the person challenging the
act must have the standing to question the validity of the subject act or issuance; (c)
the question of constitutionality must be raised at the earliest opportunity; and (d)
the issue of constitutionality must be the very lis mota of the case.
1.) YES. There exists an actual and justiciable controversy in these cases. The
requirement of contrariety of legal rights is clearly satisfied by the antagonistic
positions of the parties on the constitutionality of the Pork Barrel
System. Also, the questions in these consolidated cases are ripe for adjudication
since the challenged funds and the provisions allowing for their utilization
such as the 2013 GAA for the PDAF, PD 910 for the Malampaya Funds and PD 1869, as
amended by PD 1993, for the Presidential Social Fund are currently existing and
operational; hence, there exists an immediate or threatened injury to petitioners as a
result of the unconstitutional use of these public funds.
As for the PDAF, the Court dispelled the notion that the issues related thereto had been
rendered moot and academic by the reforms undertaken by respondents. A case
becomes moot when there is no more actual controversy between the parties
or
no
useful
purpose
can
be
served
in passing
upon
the
merits. The respondents proposed
line-item
budgeting
scheme would
not terminate the controversy nor diminish the useful purpose for its resolution since
said reform is geared towards the 2014 budget, and not the 2013
PDAF Article which,
being
a distinct subject
matter, remains
legally
effective and existing. Neither will the Presidents declaration that he had
already abolished the PDAF render the issues on PDAF moot precisely because the
Executive branch of government has no constitutional authority to nullify or
annul its legal existence.
Even on the assumption of mootness, nevertheless, jurisprudence dictates that
the moot and academic principle is not a magical formula that can automatically
dissuade the Court in resolving a case. The Court will decide cases, otherwise
moot, if:
i.) There is a grave violation of the Constitution: This is clear from the
fundamental posture of petitioners they essentially allege grave violations of
the Constitution with respect to the principles of separation of powers, nondelegability of legislative power, checks and balances, accountability and local
autonomy.
ii.) The exceptional character of the situation and the paramount public
interest is involved: This is also apparent from the nature of the interests involved
the constitutionality of the very system within which significant amounts of
public funds have been and continue to be utilized and expended undoubtedly
presents a situation of exceptional character as well as a matter of paramount public
interest. The present petitions, in fact, have been lodged at a time when the
systems flaws have never before been magnified. To the Courts mind, the
coalescence of the CoA Report, the accounts of numerous whistle-blowers,
and the governments own recognition that reforms are needed to address
the reported abuses of the PDAF demonstrates a prima facie pattern
of abuse which only underscores the importance of the matter.
It is also by this finding that the Court finds petitioners claims as not merely
theorized, speculative or hypothetical. Of note is the weight accorded by the Court
to the findings made by the CoA which is the constitutionally-mandated audit arm of the
government. if only for the purpose of validating the existence of an actual and
justiciable controversy in these cases, the Court deems the findings under the CoA
Report to be sufficient.

iii.) When the constitutional issue raised requires formulation of controlling

principles to guide the bench, the bar, and the public: This is applicable largely
due to the practical need for a definitive ruling on the systems constitutionality.
There is a compelling need to formulate controlling principles relative to the issues
raised herein in order to guide the bench, the bar, and the public, not just for the
expeditious resolution of the anticipated disallowance cases, but more importantly, so
that the government may be guided on how public funds should be utilized in
accordance with constitutional principles.
iv.) The case is capable of repetition yet evading review. This is called for by the
recognition that the preparation and passage of the national budget is,
by constitutional imprimatur, an affair of annual occurrence. The myriad of
issues underlying the manner in which certain public funds are spent, if not resolved at
this most opportune time, are capable of repetition and hence, must not evade judicial
review.
2.) YES. The intrinsic constitutionality of the Pork Barrel System is not an
issue dependent upon the wisdom of the political branches of government but
rather a legal one which the Constitution itself has commanded the Court to
act upon. Scrutinizing the contours of the system along constitutional lines is a task
that the political branches of government are incapable of rendering precisely because
it is an exercise of judicial power. More importantly, the present Constitution has not
only vested the Judiciary the right to exercise judicial power but essentially makes it a
duty to proceed therewith (Section 1, Article VIII of the 1987 Constitution).
3. YES. Petitioners have sufficient locus standi to file the instant cases. Petitioners have
come before the Court in their respective capacities as citizen-taxpayers and
accordingly, assert that they dutifully contribute to the coffers of the National
Treasury. As taxpayers, they possess the requisite standing to question the
validity of the existing Pork Barrel System under which the taxes they pay
have been and continue to be utilized. They are bound to suffer from the
unconstitutional usage of public funds, if the Court so rules. Invariably, taxpayers have
been allowed to sue where there is a claim that public funds are illegally disbursed or
that public money is being deflected to any improper purpose, or that public funds are
wasted through the enforcement of an invalid or unconstitutional law, as in these cases.
Moreover, as citizens, petitioners have equally fulfilled the standing requirement given
that the issues they have raised may be classified as matters of
transcendental importance, of overreaching significance to society, or of
paramount public interest. The CoA Chairpersons statement during the Oral
Arguments that the present controversy involves not [merely] a systems failure but a
complete breakdown of controls amplifies the seriousness of the issues involved.
Indeed, of greater import than the damage caused by the illegal expenditure of public
funds is the mortal wound inflicted upon the fundamental law by the enforcement of an
invalid statute.
4.) NO. On the one hand, res judicata states that a judgment on the merits in a
previous case rendered by a court of competent jurisdiction would bind a subsequent
case if, between the first and second actions, there exists an identity of parties, of
subject matter, and of causes of action. This required identity is not
attendant hereto since Philconsa and LAMP involved constitutional challenges against
the 1994 CDF Article and 2004 PDAF Article respectively. However, the cases at bar call
for a broader constitutional scrutiny of the entire Pork Barrel System. Also, the ruling
in LAMP is essentially a dismissal based on a procedural technicality and, thus, hardly
a judgment on the merits. Thus, res judicata cannot apply.
On the other hand, the doctrine of stare decisis is a bar to any attempt to re-litigate
where the same questions relating to the same event have been put forward by the

parties similarly situated as in a previous case litigated and decided by a

competent court. Absent any powerful countervailing considerations, like cases
ought to be decided alike. Philconsa was a limited response to a separation of
powers problem, specifically on the propriety of conferring post-enactment identification
authority to Members of Congress. On the contrary, the present cases call for a
more holistic examination of (a) the inter-relation between the CDF and PDAF
Articles with each other, formative as they are of the entire Pork Barrel System as
well as (b) the intra-relation of post-enactment measures contained within a
particular CDF or PDAF Article, including not only those related to the area of
project identification but also to the areas of fund release and realignment.
The complexity of the issues and the broader legal analyses herein warranted may be,
therefore, considered as a powerful countervailing reason against a wholesale
application of the stare decisis principle.
In addition, the Court observes that the Philconsa ruling was actually riddled with
inherent constitutional inconsistencies which similarly countervail against a
full resort to stare decisis. Since the Court now benefits from hindsight and current
findings (such as the CoA Report), it must partially abandon its previous ruling
in Philconsa insofar as it validated the post-enactment identification authority
of Members of Congress on the guise that the same was merely
recommendatory.
Again, since LAMP was dismissed on a procedural technicality and, hence, has not set
any controlling doctrine susceptible of current application to the substantive issues in
these cases, stare decisis would not apply.
B. Substantive Issues on the Congressional Pork Barrel
1.) YES. At its core, legislators have been consistently accorded post-enactment
authority to identify the projects they desire to be funded through various
Congressional Pork Barrel allocations. Under the 2013 PDAF Article, the statutory
authority of legislators to identify projects post-GAA may be construed from Special
Provisions 1 to 3 and the second paragraph of Special Provision 4. Legislators have
also been accorded post-enactment authority in the areas of fund release (Special
Provision 5 under the 2013 PDAF Article) and realignment (Special Provision 4,
paragraphs 1 and 2 under the 2013 PDAF Article).
Thus, legislators have been, in one form or another, authorized to participate in
the various operational aspects of budgeting, including the evaluation of work
and financial plans for individual activities and the regulation and release of funds, in
violation of the separation of powers principle. That the said authority is treated
as merely recommendatory in nature does not alter its unconstitutional tenor since the
prohibition covers any role in the implementation or enforcement of the law. Towards
this end, the Court must therefore abandon its ruling in Philconsa. The Court also points
out that respondents have failed to substantiate their position that the identification
authority of legislators is only of recommendatory import.
In addition to declaring the 2013 PDAF Article as well as all other provisions of law which
similarly allow legislators to wield any form of post-enactment authority in
the implementation or enforcement of the budget, the Court also declared
that informal practices, through which legislators have effectively intruded
into the proper phases of budget execution, must be deemed as acts of grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction and, hence, accorded
the same unconstitutional treatment.
2.) YES. The 2013 PDAF Article violates the principle of non-delegability since
legislators are effectively allowed to individually exercise the power
of appropriation, which, as settled in Philconsa, is lodged in Congress. The power
to appropriate must be exercised only through legislation, pursuant to Section 29(1),

Article VI of the 1987 Constitution which states: No money shall be paid out of the
Treasury except in pursuance of an appropriation made by law. The power of
appropriation, as held by the Court in Bengzon v. Secretary of Justice and
Insular Auditor, involves (a) setting apart by law a certain sum from the public
revenue for (b) a specified purpose. Under the 2013 PDAF Article,
individual legislators are given a personal lump-sum fund from which they are
able to dictate (a) how much from such fund would go to (b) a specific project
or beneficiary that they themselves also determine. Since these two acts comprise
the exercise of the power of appropriation as described in Bengzon, and given that
the 2013 PDAF Article authorizes individual legislators to perform the same,
undoubtedly, said legislators have been conferred the power to legislate which
the Constitution does not, however, allow.
3.) YES. Under the 2013 PDAF Article, the amount of P24.79 Billion only appears
as a collective allocation limit since the said amount would be further divided
among individual legislators who would then receive personal lump-sum allocations and
could, after the GAA is passed, effectively appropriate PDAF funds based on their own
discretion. As these intermediate appropriations are made by legislators only
after the GAA is passed and hence, outside of the law, it means that the
actual items of PDAF appropriation would not have been written into the
General Appropriations Bill and thus effectuated without veto consideration.
This kind of lump-sum/post-enactment legislative identification budgeting system
fosters the creation of a budget within a budget which subverts the prescribed
procedure of presentment and consequently impairs the Presidents power of
item veto. As petitioners aptly point out, the President is forced to decide between (a)
accepting the entire P24. 79 Billion PDAF allocation without knowing the specific
projects of the legislators, which may or may not be consistent with his national agenda
and (b) rejecting the whole PDAF to the detriment of all other legislators with legitimate
projects.
Even without its post-enactment legislative identification feature, the 2013 PDAF
Article would remain constitutionally flawed since the lump-sum amount of
P24.79 Billion would be treated as a mere funding source allotted for multiple
purposes of spending (i.e. scholarships, medical missions, assistance to indigents,
preservation of historical materials, construction of roads, flood control, etc). This setup
connotes that the appropriation law leaves the actual amounts and purposes of
the appropriation for further determination and, therefore, does not readily
indicate a discernible item which may be subject to the Presidents power of
item veto.
The same lump-sum budgeting scheme has, as the CoA Chairperson relays, limit[ed]
state auditors from obtaining relevant data and information that would aid in more
stringently auditing the utilization of said Funds. Accordingly, she recommends
the adoption of a line by line budget or amount per proposed program, activity or
project, and per implementing agency.
4.) YES. To a certain extent, the conduct of oversight would be tainted as said
legislators, who are vested with post-enactment authority, would, in effect, be
checking on activities in which they themselves participate. Also, this very same
concept of post-enactment authorization runs afoul of Section 14, Article VI of the
1987 Constitution which provides that: [A Senator or Member of the House of
Representatives] shall not intervene in any matter before any office of the Government
for his pecuniary benefit or where he may be called upon to act on account of his
office. Allowing legislators to intervene in the various phases of project implementation
renders them susceptible to taking undue advantage of their own office.

However, the Court cannot completely agree that the same post-enactment authority
and/or the individual legislators control of his PDAF per se would allow him to
perpetrate himself in office. This is a matter which must be analyzed based on particular
facts and on a case-to-case basis.
Also, while the Court accounts for the possibility that the close operational proximity
between legislators and the Executive department, through the formers postenactment participation, may affect the process of impeachment, this matter largely
borders on the domain of politics and does not strictly concern the Pork Barrel Systems
intrinsic constitutionality. As such, it is an improper subject of judicial assessment.
5.) NO. Section 26, Article II of the 1987 Constitution is considered as not self-executing
due to the qualifying phrase as may be defined by law. In this respect, said provision
does not, by and of itself, provide a judicially enforceable constitutional right but merely
specifies a guideline for legislative or executive action. Therefore, since there appears to
be no standing law which crystallizes the policy on political dynasties for enforcement,
the Court must defer from ruling on this issue.
In any event, the Court finds the above-stated argument on this score to be largely
speculative since it has not been properly demonstrated how the Pork Barrel System
would be able to propagate political dynasties.
6.) YES. The Court, however, finds an inherent defect in the system which actually
belies
the
avowed
intention
of making
equal
the
unequal
(Philconsa, 1994). The gauge of PDAF and CDF allocation/division is based solely
on the fact of office, without taking into account the specific interests and
peculiarities of the district the legislator represents. As a result, a district
representative of a highly-urbanized metropolis gets the same amount of funding as a
district representative of a far-flung rural province which would be relatively
underdeveloped compared to the former. To add, what rouses graver scrutiny is that
even Senators and Party-List Representatives and in some years, even the VicePresident who do not represent any locality, receive funding from the Congressional
Pork Barrel as well.
The Court also observes that this concept of legislator control underlying the CDF and
PDAF conflicts with the functions of the various Local Development Councils (LDCs)
which are already legally mandated to assist the corresponding sanggunian in setting
the direction of economic and social development, and coordinating development
efforts within its territorial jurisdiction. Considering that LDCs are instrumentalities
whose functions are essentially geared towards managing local affairs, their programs,
policies and resolutions should not be overridden nor duplicated by individual
legislators, who are national officers that have no law-making authority except only
when acting as a body.
C. Substantive Issues on the Presidential Pork Barrel
YES. Regarding the Malampaya Fund: The phrase and for such other purposes as
may be hereafter directed by the President under Section 8 of PD 910 constitutes an
undue delegation of legislative power insofar as it does not lay down a sufficient
standard to adequately determine the limits of the Presidents authority with
respect to the purpose for which the Malampaya Funds may be used. As it
reads, the said phrase gives the President wide latitude to use the Malampaya Funds for
any other purpose he may direct and, in effect, allows him to unilaterally appropriate
public funds beyond the purview of the law.

That the subject phrase may be confined only to energy resource

development and exploitation programs and projects of the government
under the principle of ejusdem generis, meaning that the general word or phrase is
to be construed to include or be restricted to things akin to, resembling, or of the
same kind or class as those specifically mentioned, is belied by three (3) reasons:
first, the phrase energy resource development and exploitation programs and projects
of the government states a singular and general class and hence, cannot be
treated as a statutory reference of specific things from which the general phrase
for such other purposes may be limited; second, the said phrase also exhausts the
class it represents, namely energy development programs of the government; and,
third, the Executive department has used the Malampaya Funds for non-energy
related purposes under the subject phrase, thereby contradicting respondents
own position that it is limited only to energy resource development and exploitation
programs and projects of the government.
However, the rest of Section 8, insofar as it allows for the use of the Malampaya Funds
to finance energy resource development and exploitation programs and projects of the
government, remains legally effective and subsisting.
Regarding the Presidential Social Fund: Section 12 of PD 1869, as amended by PD
1993, indicates that the Presidential Social Fund may be used to [first,] finance the
priority infrastructure development projects and [second,] to finance the restoration of
damaged or destroyed facilities due to calamities, as may be directed and authorized by
the Office of the President of the Philippines.
The second indicated purpose adequately curtails the authority of the President to
spend the Presidential Social Fund only for restoration purposes which arise from
calamities. The
first
indicated
purpose,
however,
gives
him carte
blanche authority to use the same fund for any infrastructure project he may
so determine as a priority. Verily, the law does not supply a definition of
priority infrastructure development projects and hence, leaves the President
without any guideline to construe the same. To note, the delimitation of a project as
one of infrastructure is too broad of a classification since the said term could
pertain to any kind of facility. Thus, the phrase to finance the priority
infrastructure
development
projects must
be
stricken
down
as
unconstitutional since

similar
to Section
8
of
PD
910
it
lies
independently unfettered by any sufficient standard of the delegating law. As
they are severable, all other provisions of Section 12 of PD 1869, as amended by
PD 1993, remains legally effective and subsisting.