BACOLOD CITY  –  More  than  20  Capitol  department heads and their deputies have joined the call for the passage of the 2013 annual budget of the provincial government of Negros Occidental.

The officers and members of the Provincial Executives Association of Negros Occidental (PEANO) led by their president, Provincial Veterinarian Renante Decena, expressed their appeal in a manifesto addressed to Vice Gov. Genaro Alvarez and the members of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan.

Before the end of last year, Gov. Alfredo Marañon Jr. had also sent a letter to the SP asking them to reconsider the disapproval of the proposed 2013 budget of P1.912 billion.

Marañon cited enumerated the reasons why the budget needs to be approved for “the greater interest of justice and the public in the spirit of the yuletide season.”

With the non-approval of this year’s budget, the provincial government is operating on a reenacted 2012 budget of about P1.8 billion.

In their manifesto, the PEANO officials and members said without a new budget, the employees cannot receive the last tranche of the mandated salary standardization that is equivalent to 25 percent of their basic pay.

The increase will not be retroactive to January if the budget is approved at a later month, they added.

“We cannot get the P20,000 Productivity Incentive Bonus since we cannot pass a supplemental budget and we cannot avail of our extra bonus for December 2013 because it is also being allocated under a supplemental budget,” the group further said.

They added: “The most important effect of the non-approval of the annual budget is that we cannot implement the development programs and projects, among these are for food security, public health and hospital operations, as well as for livelihood whose beneficiaries are the needy among the three million Negrenses.”

Without an approved budget for 2013, the provincial government cannot use the 20 percent Provincial Development Fund and the 5 percent Gender and Development Fund, the group said.

They also stressed that the province will also lose all its awards from the Department of Interior and Local Government such as for “Best Performing Province” in the Excellence in Local Governance Awards, “Gawad Pamana ng Lahi” and “Seal of Good Housekeeping” if it cannot sustain the implementation of its programs and projects.*NLG