With the recent endorsement of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. for the passage of the proposed Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF) Act, a senior lawmaker on Monday appealed to the public to give the proposal a chance.
Camarines Sur Rep. LRay Villafuerte, in a news statement, said the Maharlika bill, which has been certified as urgent measure, is designed to mobilize savings for augmenting funds for big-ticket infrastructure works and other priority programs meant to help the government improve the lives of all Filipinos.
In a related development, House leaders on Monday welcomed the result of a recent nationwide survey showing that half of Filipinos “support” the proposed MIF.
Speaker Martin G. Romualdez issued the statement after the mobile-based poll was conducted by data research firm Tangere last December 8 to 10, before the House approved the MIF bill on third and final reading last Thursday.
“We are happy with the survey, which to us means that we are on the right track in advocating the establishment of this sovereign wealth fund, which is intended to benefit future generations of Filipinos,” Romualdez said.
“It shows that our advocacy has the support not just of major business groups but of the general population as well,” Romualdez said.
The survey had 2,400 respondents: 12 percent from Metro Manila, 23 percent from North and Central Luzon, 22 percent from South Luzon, 20 percent from Visayas, and 23 percent from Mindanao. It had a margin of error of 2.191 percent.
In the same statement, Martin Peñaflor, chief executive officer and founder of data research firm Tangere, said 2,010 or 83.75 percent of the 2,400 respondents were aware of the MIF bill.
Given this administration’s limited fiscal space resulting mainly from the enormous spending by the previous government for Covid-19 response, Villafuerte appealed to all Filipinos to support the President’s appeal for the public to give House Bill (HB) 6608 a chance and wait for the Congress to hammer out what Marcos described as the “perfect” version of this sovereign fund.
President Marcos last week endorsed HB 6608 as an urgent bill, enabling the House to pass it on second reading and then on third reading (by a 279-6 vote) before Congress went on its annual Christmas break from December 17 to January 22, 2023.
“The President has said that it was his idea regarding the MIF, and that our people should give it a try and let the Congress come up with a bill acceptable to the people and with the proper safeguards,” Villafuerte, who is majority leader of the Commission on Appointments (CA), said at the CA committee hearing on the designation of erstwhile University of the Philippines economics professor Arsenio Balisacan as director-general of the National Economic and Development Authority and concurrent Socioeconomic Planning Secretary.
Villafuerte, who is one of the bill’s co-authors and president of the National Unity Party (NUP) that is the second biggest power bloc in the House of Representatives, expressed his backing for HB 6608 after asking Balisacan at the public hearing whether he supported the proposed MIF.
“We are in full support, Your Honor. In fact, the recent statement read by Secretary Ben (jamin) Diokno was a joint statement among us in the Cabinet and economic team. So that’s an expression of our full commitment,” said Balisacan, who first served as Neda chief and socioeconomic planning secretary during the administration of the late President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.
In that joint statement mentioned by Balisacan, the President’s economic team led by Diokno said they expect the MIF to boost investments and funding of infrastructure projects, particularly in agriculture, to move forward the Marcos administration’s “Agenda for Prosperity.”
At the CA panel hearing, Villafuerte told Balisacan: “I think we should give it (MIF) a try. When the President said we should give it a try, we are all up for it. There’s no harm in trying as long as the proper safeguards are there. At the end of the day, it’s up to the Congress to really come out with a good measure.”
Balisacan said at his CA hearing that it was his “personal view” that “the laws that Congress pass are good or bad depending on how you (lawmakers) make it, and governance is key to that. But the governance framework that you put into the law, that’s what, makes it workable or not workable. So that’s why I think that having that proposal … to Congress will allow us to debate the merits or demerits of the proposal, and put the appropriate assurance that it will work.”
For the Neda chief, the proposed MIF “has the potential of attracting funds into … that otherwise is not used in a way that addresses the immediate concerns and priorities for national development … that fund could supplement the limited fiscal resources that we have. For example, it could be used to improve the attractiveness of PPP (public-private partnership) projects, particularly for critical areas like infrastructure.”