00:01Senator Ping Laxon says the Senate majority bloc will remove corruption-prone items from the House's proposed 2027 national budget.
00:09State auditors say firms with questionable capacity bag thousands of public works contracts worth more than P459 billion.
00:17The Moro National Liberation Front denies claims it is sheltering Senator Bato de la Rosa.
00:23The Department of Education buys 170,000 MacBook Neo laptops for teachers and staff.
00:28And the U.S. Supreme Court rejects the Trump administration's request to stop California from counting 20,000 mail-in
00:35ballots.
00:45Senator Ping Laxon says the Senate majority bloc is united in removing corruption-prone items from the House-approved version
00:52of the proposed 2027 national budget.
00:54Laxon says the majority of senators are rallying behind Senate Finance Committee Chairman J.B. Ejercito's efforts to cleanse the
01:012027 budget of unwarranted, whimsical, and corruption-prone items.
01:05All means all.
01:07Laxon also says Ejercito secured the Department of Public Works and Highways' commitment that it will submit all supporting documents
01:13for its infrastructure projects by Tuesday, November 3.
01:16Projects without the required documents would be removed.
01:19Budget advocacy groups like the People's Budget Coalition and BetterGovPH flagged nearly 7,000 projects worth P190 billion with no
01:27published project attachments.
01:29A separate Senate review also found the number of DPWH projects increased from 11,420 in the National Expenditure Program
01:36to 16,244 in the House-approved General Appropriations Bill.
01:41Laxon also says Ejercito will invite civil society organizations to observe the bicameral conference committee deliberations on the budget.
01:50A report by state auditors says firms with questionable capacity bag thousands of public works contracts.
01:56The Commission on Audit, or COA, says the Department of Public Works and Highways, or DPWH, awarded around 11,000
02:03projects worth more than P459 billion to contractors with incomplete statements of ongoing contracts in 2024 and 2025.
02:11This made the computation of their Net Financial Contracting Capacity, or NFCC, inaccurate.
02:17The NFCC is used to determine whether a contractor has the financial capacity to take on a project and qualify
02:23for bidding.
02:23The COA says contractors failed to disclose projects with other government agencies, local government units, government-owned or controlled corporations,
02:31and private entities.
02:33It also found that NFCC computations were not updated in subsequent bids.
02:37The DPWH acknowledged the absence of a systematic or independent mechanism for cross-checking contractors' commitments versus actual ongoing projects.
02:46The Ilocos region, the bailiwick of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., recorded the highest number of contracts awarded to bidders with
02:52deficient disclosures at 1,893.
02:55It was followed by Northern Mindanao with 1,328 contracts, Calabarzon with 1,289, Cagayan Valley with 1,213, and
03:04Central Luzon with 1,134.
03:07In terms of total contract value, however, Mimaropa topped the list with more than 65 billion pesos in projects awarded
03:13to bidders with questionable NFCC computations.
03:18The Moro National Liberation Front, or MNLF, denies it is the, quote, powerful armed group sheltering Senator Bato De La
03:25Rosa.
03:25This after Interior Secretary John Vic Remulia said he received information that De La Rosa was being protected by an
03:31armed group in Mindanao.
03:33The group says the MNLF is not cuddling Senator Bato. There is no established formal relationship between Senator Ronald Bato
03:40De La Rosa and the MNLF.
03:42Remulia also warned that attempting a forced arrest on the lawmaker could cost 10,000 lives, to explain why he
03:48would rather negotiate the senator's surrender.
03:50De La Rosa has been out of public view since May and made the ICC arrest warrant.
03:55While the Interior Chief did not identify the alleged armed group, the MNLF was quick to distance itself from the
04:01speculation.
04:01The group insists personal ties between former President Rodrigo Duterte and MNLF founder Nur Miswari should not be construed as
04:08evidence that the group was hiding De La Rosa.
04:12The Department of Education completes a massive procurement of 170,000 MacBook Neo laptops for teachers and staff nationwide.
04:21Apple announces the transaction during its Financial Results Conference call for the fourth quarter of 2026, Tuesday, November 3.
04:28Education Secretary Sonny Angaras says the agency welcomes the participation of the American tech company in the competitive bidding for
04:35its latest project under the DepEd Computerization Program.
04:38The DepEd says it secured 172,654 Apple MacBook Neo laptops, which will be deployed from November through March 2027.
04:46A total of 169,008 units will be for public school teachers, while the remaining around 3,600 will be
04:52for public school administrative officers.
04:54The agency says it secured the package at approximately 43,000 pesos per unit, which is 6,990 pesos cheaper
05:02than the base model's Philippine-suggested retail price of 49,990 pesos.
05:07Aside from the MacBook Neo's, contracts have also been awarded for 62,717 Windows-based units.
05:14President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. promised the delivery of laptops to every public school teacher during his 2025 state-of-the
05:21-nation address.
05:21Teacher groups have been calling out Marcos for the delay.
05:26The U.S. Supreme Court rejects the Trump administration's request to temporarily stop California from counting some 20,000 mail
05:33-in ballots.
05:34Those ballots are from registered voters the administration claims are not U.S. citizens.
05:39The administration wanted California to hold off counting the ballots until it makes sure every one of those 20,000
05:44registered voters are U.S. citizens.
05:46California is the country's most populous state and the stronghold of the Democratic Party.
05:51California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, calls the court's decision a welcome sight for all Americans given the disgusting and
05:58dangerous attacks on our democracy by the federal government.
06:01This as Trump and congressional candidates made their final arguments to U.S. voters on Monday, November 2, the eve
06:07of the midterm elections.
06:09Tensions also rose in Michigan where Abdul El-Sayed aims to become the first Muslim elected to the Senate.
06:14Trump urged Republicans to pretend he is on the ballot in an effort to increase voter participation.
06:19Democrats are widely favored to retake the House but face a greater challenge in the Senate.
06:24Loss of control in either chamber would constrain Trump and empower Democrats to investigate his administration.
06:30A Senate majority would also allow them to block his appointees to federal courts including the Supreme Court.
06:37And that's today's wrap. I'm JC Guttinga. Thank you for watching.
06:40Click the link below for the full story.
06:42For more updates, download the Rappler app.
