By Francis Allan L. Angelo

THE “Black Friday” affair of Iloilo capitol workers will be prolonged as Governor Niel Tupas had asked the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to declare as inoperative the appropriations ordinance authorizing the 10 percent salary increase for the provincial employees.

The Sangguniang Panlalawigan approved Appropriations Ordinance 2008-02 last September 9 to implement the DBM’s Local Budget Circular 88 mandating and setting the guidelines for the 10 percent pay hike.

Tupas received the measure September 10 for his signature but he refused to take action.

The governor said he let AO 2008-02 lapse into an ordinance after the 15-day reglamentary period to hasten its review by the DBM.

The 10 percent pay increase was supposed to be released Thursday last week but Tupas refused to budge saying he will wait for the DBM ruling.

Capitol workers vowed to continue wearing black clothes every Friday if the provincial government does not release their increase.

Vice Governor Rolex Suplico said Tupas should pity the workers and implement the increase the soonest time possible.

Suplico said the Sanggunian has done its work by passing an ordinance mandating the increase.

But in his letter to DBM regional director Nilo Buot, Tupas said AO 2008-02 suffers from legal infirmity because the SP “failed to appropriate the statutory and mandatory 20 percent of the underestimated internal revenue allotment (IRA) share of the province for developmental projects.”

The governor also scored the AO for failure to set aside money for the 5 percent calamity fund.

The Iloilo provincial government is operating under the 2007 reenacted budget after the DBM nixed as inoperative the 2008 budget approved by the opposition-dominated provincial board.

“The DBM has consistently ruled that appropriations ordinances that do not include statutory obligations are not valid, hence, inoperative. This ordinance is thereby illegal, invalid and inoperative if we go by previous rulings of your agency. But we will leave it to your agency to pass judgment on this issue,” Tupas said.

Tupas said the AO 2008-02 is illegal because it skipped the budget process in Republic Act 7160 (Local Government Code) by disregarding his request for supplemental for the salary hike.

“…It was the committee on appropriations that proposed an appropriation measure to implement a presidential directive on a 10-percent salary increase for LGU officials and employees, and not on the basis of the request for a supplemental budget that I had submitted,” he said.

The governor said the provincial board’s move contravenes Section 318 of RA 7160 that vests upon the local chief executive the duty to prepare the executive budget and supplemental budgets to be submitted to SP approval.