The administration of Cebu Governor Pamela Baricuatro has moved to resolve a significant funding shortfall for a key student assistance program by injecting an additional P75 million into its budget.
Addressing a Budgetary Shortfall
This substantial augmentation for the Cebu Province Grants Intended for Tertiary Students, known as CP-Gifts, aims to cover unpaid monthly allowances. The need arose because the actual number of scholars greatly surpassed initial projections.
Cebu Province Assistant Administrator Aldwin Empaces revealed that when the current administration took office, financial obligations for the program had already exceeded the allotted funds. He attributed part of the problem to weak monitoring systems, which allowed billings to accumulate beyond the approved budget ceiling.
Some submitted claims were for amounts higher than the available funds, leading directly to payment delays for beneficiaries.
Scholars Endure Long Waits for Stipends
The budget crisis had real consequences for students. According to a December 17 report by SunStar Cebu, scholars made public appeals to the Provincial Government over year-long delays in their allowances for the 2024 and 2025 semesters.
Many reported waiting between five months to a full year for their stipends. They cited explanations from program focal persons pointing to administrative hurdles like lack of budget, pending signatures, leadership changes, and batch payroll processing.
Under the CP-Gifts program, each qualified scholar is entitled to a monthly stipend of P2,000, which totals P10,000 per semester. These funds are disbursed directly to the scholars' Landbank ATM accounts.
Path Forward and Future Safeguards
Provincial Board Member Raymond Calderon, who authored the CP-Gifts ordinance, provided the budgetary context. The approved budget for 2025 was P50 million, while the allocation for the coming year, 2026, has been set at a much higher P150 million.
To tackle the current backlog, the Office of the Governor is now actively processing the P75 million budget augmentation. Empaces stated that most pending obligations are already queued for payment, with releases expected either before the end of this year or by the first quarter of January 2026.
He clarified the workflow: while the CP-Gifts program is managed by the Governor's Office, Provincial Board members are responsible for endorsing scholars and submitting the required documents from their respective districts. The executive office then processes the billings once requirements are complete.
Empaces took the opportunity to emphasize that CP-Gifts scholars are beneficiaries of the Cebu Provincial Government as a whole, not of individual board members. He assured the public that the administration will implement stricter monitoring and clearer controls to prevent similar delays from happening in the future.
