Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri pledged to ensure that funds are allocated in the 2025 national budget to enable the newly created Negros Island Region to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2025.
“We need to hit the ground running” so funds must be allocated for the NIR to be implemented to its fullest in 2025, Zubiri said at a press conference in Bacolod City on Wednesday, July 3.
Zubiri said he will partner with the NIR congressmen in ensuring that the new region is adequately funded.
Zubiri, principal author of the NIR bill in the Senate, met with Negros Occidental Gov. Eugenio Jose Lacson, Vice Governor Jeffrey Ferrer and Representatives Gerardo Valmayor, Emilio Yulo III and Mercedes Alvarez, Negros Oriental Rep. Manuel Sagarbarria and Bacolod Rep. Greg Gasataya for an NIR thanksgiving lunch at L’Fisher Hotel in Bacolod City on Wednesday.
During the 2025 budget hearings at the Senate, Zubiri said he will ask every department to report on the status of their compliance with the NIR law and the budgets they will allocate for the new region.
He will also ask them for their specific plans of action for their NIR regional offices, Zubiri said.
The NIR will hasten progress and development of Negros Occidental, Negros Oriental and Siquijor, he assured.
Zubiri also assured the people of Siquijor that their being part of the NIR will be to their advantage with the regional offices in Dumaguete City just 20 minutes away from their island.
He also pointed out that many of the choice departments under the NIR are located in Dumaguete City.
Rep. Alvarez said definitely no province under the NIR will be left behind.
A Technical Working Group will convene in July to discuss the roadmap for the NIR, Alvarez said.
She is proposing that the Department of Agriculture regional office be placed at the Central Philippines State University campus in Kabankalan City.
Alvarez said she will also propose the setting up of extension or sub regional offices in the NIR provinces where the main regional offices are not located.
Vice Governor Ferrer thanked President Ferdinand Marcos, House Speaker Martin Romualdez, Zubiri and the lawmakers responsible for the passage of the NIR law.*