Kaban ni D_BystandeR: PAGWARI-WARI SA KUWARTA SA KATAWHAN

This is a clear waste of money out of the taxes paid by poor Juan dela Cruz. The SET (Senate Electoral Tribunal), with no performance target reflected in the 2014 budget is a pure case of a "white elephant" where members and  employees are doing nothing but enjoy their "fattening" experience without work.

Footnote: The SET is getting a budget of P87.1M for this year with no case pending with the tribunal, since there was no election protest filed against any senator elected in the combined congressional-local elections in May last year, the members and employees have no other recourse but to accept their huge pay and allowances. The P87.1M is for the salaries and other benefits of the tribunal's 116 officials and employees, and for the allowances of its nine members led by senior Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio. Two other Justices - Teresita Leonardo de Castro and Arturo Brion - and six senators sit in the Senate electoral court. This means that it has no protest to resolve until 2016, when a new batch of 12 senators is elected. Apparently due to criticism that the Senate tribunal has no case to resolve,  Congress, largely upon the initiative of the Senate, has  reduced the SET budget for 2014 from P126.7M as proposed by Pres. Aquino and adopted by the House, to P87.1M, or a decrease of P39.6M.  But do not be misled by allowances they received because during the impeachment trial of former CJ Corona, the Senate impeachment court was informed that Corona earned more than P1M in several months that he sat in the House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal (HRET).