Senatorial candidate Panfilo Lacson inducted the newly elected Board of Trustees of the Bohol Chamber of Commerce and Industry during their regular monthly meeting held at the Be Grand Resort in Panglao, Bohol on March 18, 2016. Lacson presented to the board his advocacy called “BRAVE” which is essentially a proposal on how to make the national budget legislation become more inclusive to far flung municipalities.
The former police chief presented a trend in the national budget situation where a significant portion of the budget ends up unspent at the end of the year. Lacson proposes that this perennially unspent budget would be better allocated as additional development funds for the local government units throughout the country.
After his presentation, the chamber trustees engage Lacson in an open forum where he emphasized his position against corruption. Lacson is known for not using his pork barrel allocation or the PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund) at the same time he is calling for its abolition. The PDAF controversy in 2013 exposed the systematic corruption done using the PDAF as a means to extract money out of the national treasury.
Lacson also clarified that the Yolanda relief donations from other countries did not go into the national treasury but were spend directly by the donor countries through NGOs and volunteers. However, he said that the country was not able to utilize most of the funds because of delayed implementation of rehabilitation efforts part of which would have been funded by the foreign donations.
Engr. Al Uy, President of the BCCI, presided over the meeting. Two new members from tricycle operator and driver’s association were inducted into the chamber membership.
Senatorial candidate Panfilo Lacson (left) inducted the newly elected BCCI board of trustees.
