A widely-shared Facebook (FB) Reel is making it appear that the Supreme Court (SC) has ordered the return of “P60 million” that the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) transmitted to the national treasury as unused funds. This is not true.
The video in the reel was only a remark of a justice and not an official Court decision. The amount mentioned in the Reel is also wrong.
A reader sent a request through VERA Files’ Messenger Misinformation Tip Line to verify the Reel posted by a netizen on April 5. The clip was overlaid with text which read:
“PINABALIK NG SUPREME COURT ANG PERA NG PHILHEALTH 60M
TAPOS KANA BBM MAG BAYAD KANA SA MGA GINAGAWA MONG HINDI MAGANDA SA BAYAN”
(SUPREME COURT ORDERED THE RETURN OF PHILHEALTH’S 60M FUNDS
YOU’RE THROUGH, BBM! TIME TO PAY FOR YOUR ILL ACTIONS AGAINST THE COUNTRY)
The Reel featured an audio clip of Associate Justice Antonio Kho Jr. speaking during the Court’s oral arguments on March 4 discussing the return of PhilHealth’s unused funds from 2023.
“PhilHealth can already request the president to return the money, the Php 60 billion that were transmitted to PhilHealth— to the unprogrammed funds, ibalik na ‘yan sa (return it to) PhilHealth, and PhilHealth to expand its benefits, hire more people to answer for the needs of the health of our people. That would be all.”
The quote from Kho was not an official order. The SC has not yet issued a decision on the PhilHealth fund transfer.
Lawmakers inserted a special provision in the 2024 General Appropriations Act allowing the government to remit unused funds from government-owned and -controlled corporations into unprogrammed funds for the next year’s budget.
The Department of Budget and Management defines unprogrammed appropriations as standby funds in the national budget that can be accessed by agencies if tax revenues for the year fall below target or are insufficient to fund government projects.
In compliance, the Department of Finance issued Circular 003-2024 on Feb. 27, 2024 identifying Php 89.9 billion in unused funds from PhilHealth and ordering its transfer back to the national treasury. So far, PhilHealth has returned P60 billion.
Upon receiving three petitions challenging the legality of the provision, the SC issued a temporary restraining order blocking the last transfer on Oct. 30, 2024. The Court began oral arguments on the consolidated petitions last Feb. 4. The debate continued into a fifth round of oral arguments on April 3.
The FB reel was posted by the user Charliemac Gaming Catedrilla and has since garnered over 48,000 reactions, 5,100 comments and 16,000 shares.
