President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered other government agencies with infrastructure items in their budgets to follow the move of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to reduce the cost for construction materials by as much as 50 percent.
The directive covers the Department of Education, Department of Agriculture, Department of the Interior and Local Government, Department of Health, Department of Transportation, National Irrigation Administration, and other relevant agencies.
This will result in the reduction by half of the costs for 2026 of farm-to-market roads, classrooms, hospitals and irrigation canals, among other government projects.
Quality not compromised
‘So let me be clear. The quality of what we build will not be compromised. The only thing weakened will be corruption,’ the President said in a speech before his departure to South Korea to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) meetings from Oct. 30 to Nov. 2.
‘This is the accountability that our citizens deserve. It will not be limited to the public works, but we shall be the norm across all of government,’ he added.
According to the President, the funds that the government would save by cutting the costs of the projects would be used to support other social programs.
‘The savings we secure will go where they matter most. The programs that uplift families, support livelihoods, and strengthen communities. Because when our people grow in capability and confidence, the nation grows with them,’ Marcos said.
‘A government that honors public trust, a nation that stands firm on integrity this is our promise, and real change for Filipinos today and for all generations to come,’ he added.
On Oct. 25, before he attended the 47th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) Summit in Malaysia, Marcos ordered DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon to cut the agency’s standard costs for construction materials by half after learning that these were overpriced.
According to Marcos, the reform would align the project costs of DPWH with real market prices and reduce if not prevent corruption in the agency.
The cost reduction comes in the wake of the corruption scandal that cost the government multibillion-peso losses from irregular, incomplete, substandard and ‘ghost’ flood control projects that the president himself exposed in August.
Dizon himself called the President’s directive ‘single biggest reform ever in the DPWH.’
‘The lowering of material costs is just one of the many reforms and changes we need to implement in the DPWH,’ Dizon said. ‘In my view, that is the most important one because if we can bring those costs down, we automatically bring down corruption as well.’