Alagang Angara

Year in and year out education is provided with the biggest budget under the General Appropriations Act and for next year’s version of the law, this remains the top priority.   

Senator Sonny Angara said the reconciled version of the P4.1 trillion national budget that was approved by Congress granted an increase of P17.1 billion for the Department of Education (DepEd), the State Universities and Colleges (SUC), and the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) to fund various programs.    

Government employees and officials will receive increases in their salaries on January 1 next year once Congress approves the final version of the Salary Standardization Law 5 (SSL-5) within the week, Senator Sonny Angara said today.

The Senate approved on third and final reading Senate Bill 1219 with a vote of 21-0-1, shortly after the House of Representatives passed its own version of the SSL-5. Minority Leader Franklin Drilon was the lone senator who abstained from voting on the measure.

With close to 400 medals won by the Philippine contingent in the 30th Southeast Asian Games (SEA Games), the national team has brought tremendous pride to the country.

Part of the impressive medal haul were 149 gold medals, a feat that was achieved through hard work and a lot of personal sacrifice on the part of the Philippine contingent.

The Senate today honored the Philippine National Arnis Team (PNAT) for its sterling performance in the ongoing 30th Southeast Asian Games.

Senator Sonny Angara filed the Senate Resolution No. 247 recognizing the historic feat of the PNAT, which further solidified the Philippines’ mastery of the sport and the martial arts discipline.

Senator Sonny Angara is set to file a resolution seeking to honor the hero cop who gave his life to save several school children from an armed assailant.

In filing the resolution, Angara said Police Master Sergeant Jason Magno made the ultimate sacrifice when he used his body to cover a grenade thrown by a man who ran amok inside the Initao College campus in Misamis Oriental.

Senator Sonny Angara praised his fellow senators for further raising the “compassion index” of the 2020 national budget by hiking allocations for social services.

The chair of the Senate finance committee gave the assurance that the amendments to education, health and social welfare programs in the P4.1 trillion spending bill are “targeted and transparent.”

Child and teenage pregnancies in the country are growing at an alarming rate and it is imperative for the government to do something about this at the soonest possible time, Senator Sonny Angara said today.

The data on child and teenage pregnancies in the country should be a cause for alarm and the Commission on Population and Development (POPCOM) believes it warrants being declared a national emergency.

Every day overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are subjected to abuse in one form or another in the countries they are deployed and need all the assistance that they can get from the government.

In April this year, the President signed Republic Act 11299 establishing the Office for Social Welfare Attache and to date, a total of seven active posts have been filled namely Malaysia/Brunei; Jeddah; Riyadh; Kuwait; Hong Kong; Qatar; and Dubai.

No Filipino should neglect caring for their teeth due to lack of funds.

Senator Sonny Angara is pushing for the creation of a dental unit in each of the rural health units of the Department of Health (DOH) so that all Filipinos, particularly the poor, will have access to dentists.

“Marami sa ating kababayan na ayaw magpatingin sa dentista dahil lang sa takot nila na kailangan magbayad ng napaka mahal na halaga. Dahil dito, malaking bahagi ng ating populasyon ay may mga sirang ngipin na hindi napapaayos,” Angara said.

Senator Sonny Angara on Saturday aired his support to the price ceiling implemented by the Department of Health (DOH) for certain medicines, which he said will provide some degree of relief to the consumers, especially the poor.

The DOH recently included 120 medicines under the maximum retail price (MRP) scheme to help bring down the price of life-saving drugs for Filipinos.

Included in the new list are medicines for killer diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular, chronic lung diseases, neonatal diseases, renal disease, and major cancers.