Challenges

The annual battle for the full release of the I.R.A. is one that should be followed closely by all advocates of local autonomy for it will be a test of how serious the Republic is in its establishment of genuine local autonomy. Perhaps, if the interests of ULAP will not allow it to pursue its rightful demands to the Supreme Court, it is up to the taxpayers who suffer the I.R.A. cuts to press suit. Clearly the issue of the I.R.A. release is far from over and if the local government executives will not act on it, then someone must.

But even if the issue is resolved in the courts and they deem that the I.R.A. should be released as legislated, civil society advocates for local autonomy still have a great task cut out for them in regard to fiscal autonomy. Firstly, they must push local governments to work harder to explore local sources of revenue because national government will always look for ways to cut the I.R.A.. If they cannot reduce actual percentages of the allocation then they will continue to reduce the base from which they compute the I.R.A. share. Civil society should help local governments explore non-I.R.A. sources of revenue and funding in order to build the economic base of their localities. Secondly, they should push for greater social services spending since the local governments are at the front line of social welfare provision. This means that they must push for the proper use of whatever little funds the LGUs have. In the third volume of the Commission on Audit's Annual Financial Report on Local Governments cited by the December 23, 1999 issue of Businessworld, the commission notes that the 20% development fund from the I.R.A. that the Code sets aside for development purposes is used like "an almost unsupervised mini-pork barrel." Instead of using the fund for basic human needs and development projects, it is diverted to infrastructure projects, ghost and non-viable projects, "hardware splurges," "highly irregular and grossly unnecessary tourism projects," loan payments, and even vehicles. Local executives must remember that direct spending on social and economic development is necessary because the trickle down effect of development does not address the problem of the lack of basic human needs. Therefore, the more visible and politically attractive infrastructure projects that may bring some economic growth will not address the fact that more and more infants are dying and poor people have no homes. Advocates of local autonomy should at least push for clear annual development plans to ensure that the development funds will be used properly. But most importantly, civil society should constantly remind local government authorities that for local autonomy to work, for them to win a more meaningful autonomy from the national government, they should show that they are responsible managers of the autonomous units they were elected to govern.

Civil society must also push the national government to appreciate the need for the strengthening of local autonomy for genuine democracy which will lead to genuine development. To date, national government at every branch shows little appreciation for local autonomy. The executive works to curtail this autonomy by trying to curtail the powers of local government executives and it continues to cut the base of the I.R.A. computation. The legislature continues to cut LGU funding. Rather than hamper local autonomy, the national government should work to strengthen autonomy, and one concrete step toward this is the strengthening of local fiscal autonomy. Clearly, local governments should be helped past their I.R.A. dependence. This means the Department of Budget and Management should study alternative sources of funding for LGUs, especially those which are not deemed credit worthy by commercial financial institutions. More information on available official development assistance should be made available to less developed LGUs without solid tax bases. Assistance should be given to these LGUs to make them more credit worthy, i.e. they must be taught better fiscal practices. Assistance should also be given for these LGUs to exploit their tax bases as well as the maximization of their taxing powers, this means better tax mapping and efficient tax collection as well as the exploration of non-tradition taxation.

The I.R.A. issue is a tremendous opportunity for civil society governance advocates and local government executives to come together in agreement and collaboration. The ULAP has already began to network with civil society advocates to help them at least bring the importance of this issue to the attention of the general population. Civil society must seize this opportunity to work with the ULAP because the I.R.A. is a cause worth fighting for. It is, after all the life-blood of local autonomy. But in such an alliance, civil society must not forget the issue they are fighting for, i.e. the democratization which is at the heart of local autonomy. Civil society must collaborate with the local executives in this issue with the understanding that their role is to push for greater democratization and people's participation in governance in order to deliver the disenfranchised masses from their political, social and economic marginalization. Civil society should fight for the automatic release of the I.R.A. and for genuine fiscal autonomy in order to ensure that the best ideals of local autonomy are achieved, not in order to further the worst features of local, patronage politics.

This is the greater problem that the I.R.A. issue has brought to fore: i. e. the issue of the deepening of local autonomy through local fiscal autonomy in order to achieve greater democratization. Today, local government executives are still not aware of the value of democratization for the deepening of governance in the autonomous local governments. The strengthening of fiscal position of local governments should lead to the greater financing of local democratization. However, many local executives are still not appreciative of networking and partnership efforts of local civil society groups. Local executives also thwart the institution of people's participation in governance, such as local representation in the local legislature, because of the lack of funds of local government. Civil society groups are fighting to strengthen fiscal autonomy in order to make available funds for local democratization. These moves for greater civil society participation are essential for the development of the localities. These groups do not only serve to fiscalize governance at the local level but can also serve as partners in development because they bring to government the voice and talents of the people at the locality. But if local executives continue to block efforts at civil society participation in governance, such as the local sectoral representation system and the participation of NGOs and POs in local development boards and other local special bodies, then they will lose their support for the strengthening of local fiscal autonomy and for genuine development.

For the I.R.A. issue, the ULAP sought the support of civil society groups for their cause. Civil society groups involved in the struggle to institute local autonomy threw their support for the campaign to restore the cuts to the I.R.A.. Groups like the Local Governance Policy Forum is even willing to take the battle further than ULAP It is still pressing for the I.R.A. issue to be taken to the Supreme Court. However, this support is being given with the understanding that greater resources given to local government should translate to greater efforts at instituting democratic participation in governance on the part of the local government units for greater autonomy and greater people's participation in governance is the only path to follow in truly serving the people in the localities and the nation they are citizens of.