For 17 straight years, Sen. Joker Arroyo has remained the undisputed “Scrooge of Congress” for being the thriftiest, most frugal, tight-fisted, penny-pinching lawmaker.
The officially published Itemized List of Expenses of each senator for 2007 as audited by Commission on Audit (COA) showed that Arroyo had the lowest expenses for incumbent senators who served the full 12 months.
COA statistics showed that the senator incurred expenses of P12,293,084.06.
Only Sen. Manuel Villar came close, spending P12,442,323.98. Villar was ousted last November following speculations that he may have used his previous position as Senate President to pursue his presidential plans.
The COA report showed actors-turned-senators were the biggest spenders. Sen. Bong Revilla was on top with P15,889,626.66 followed by President Pro-Tempore Jinggoy Estrada with P15,449,229.69. Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan’s expenses amounted to P15,271,305.21 while Sen. Lito Lapid spent P15,103,242.15.
What can I say? Well, kudos to Joker Arroyo for being frugal. To our guapo Senators for being wasteful, Adios! Your motto seems to be, "Doing less with more."
For a related account on the spending of Congress, read PCIJ's report: An Expensive---and Unaccountable---Legislature.
I think the more appropriate term, especially pertaining to Jinggoy, should be "doing NOTHING with more".
ReplyDeleteBut in fairness to the man, he's seen on TV something. Yet it all seems to amount to nothing in the end.
ReplyDelete