Of  course, the two constitutionally independent bodies have every right to be upset or outraged even.

As institutional counter-force to Executive abuses or excesses, they must be co-equal not only in terms of separate and sometimes adversarial powers; they must have the budgets commensurate to their individual mandates and the size of the respective  organizations under their jurisdictions.

By scrimping on their budgets, the Department of Budget and Management is betraying Malacanang’s plan to weaken the Judiciary and the state audit agency to make them not fiscally fit to fulfill their respective mandates.

The Supreme Court is the court of last recourse where the constitutionality of official government actions can be questioned and settled with finality.

The Commission on Audit, on the other hand, is the independent  financial examiner independent of the three major branches of government, including Congress.          

By instituting savage budget cuts on the two agencies,  is it any wonder that the SC and the CoA are singing the blues before the House committee on appropriations?

They are complaining of reductions in their 2012 budget made by the DBM. 

S C Administrator Midas Marquez told an appropriations subcommittee hearing that the DBM has effectively reduced next year’s funds for the Judiciary by P1.9 billion to a little over P13 billion.

Marquez said the P1.9  billion, which the DBM transferred to a lump-sum appropriation in the proposed P1.8-trillion 2010 budget called “miscellaneous personnel benefits fund,”was  intended for unfilled positions that the SC plans to fill next year.

He said if the vacant posts cannot be filled for lack of qualified applicants, the SC would use the money to provide additional allowances for judges assigned to render extra work in vacant courts.

The SC spokesman  said the DBM decision to transfer funds for unfilled positions violates the Judiciary’s constitutional independence and fiscal autonomy.

CoA chairperson Gracia Pulido Tan made a similar complaint.

Tan said the DBM moved P1.85 billion for vacant positions in their 2012 budget to the miscellaneous personnel benefits fund.

On Monday, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales said P432 million of their funds was transferred to the same lump-sum item.

Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez presented a motion to the subcommittee chaired by Camarines Sur Rep. Rolando Andaya Jr. to restore the cuts made by the DBM.

“We should uphold the independence and fiscal autonomy of the Supreme Court, the CoA and the Ombudsman,” Rdriguez said.

Andaya, a former DBM secretary, said no money was actually taken away from the independent agencies since the funds were merely transferred to a lump-sum appropriation.

He said in the interest of transparency, all funds for unfilled positions in the bureaucracy have been placed in one budget item “so that the DBM could monitor the filling of these positions and the money would be released only when necessary and used only for the purpose for which it is intended”.

“All the affected agencies have to do is to apply for and justify the filling of these positions,” he said.