Christmas came early for some 3,000 employees of the House of Representatives.

Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on Monday said she had authorized the release of a “special cash allowance” amounting to P35,000 for each of the regular and contractual workers of the 292-member legislature.

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The former President approved the release of the cash bonus a month after she ordered the distribution of P5,000 in grocery allowance for House personnel.

“Somebody from Congress told me that August and September are, to use his words, ‘cash-strapped months’ because of the many loan applications [of the employees],” Arroyo told the House employees after their weekly flag-raising ceremony.

“I have seen you work hard over the last eight years. Even during my period of hospital detention, you worked on my bills, you took care of my benefits, and you took care of my room,” she said.

She credited Leyte Rep. Yedda Marie Romualdez, chair of the House accounts committee, for looking for the source of the cash bonus, which the Speaker approved as the country’s inflation rate continued to spiral. —MARLON RAMOS

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