MANILA, Philippines — President Duterte has called for a faster budget deliberation process as he blamed the delay in the passage of this year’s spending bill for the country’s slower economic growth. Duterte said the delayed passage of the 2019 budget had affected the government’s expenditure on key items, including his Build Build Build infrastructure program. So no spending, no activity, nobody was paying, nobody was buying because there was no money especially the Build Build Build,” Duterte said during the oath taking of local officials in Davao City last Friday. Medyo nag-dive tayo kasi ‘yon nga ‘yung budget na-hostage (We took a slight nosedive because the budget was held hostage). The President signed the 2019 budget in April but vetoed public works projects with a total allocation of P95.37 billion.

Source: Philippine Star June 23, 2019 17:26 UTC