BAGUIO CITY—Anti-corruption advocates are challenging Public Works Secretary Mark Villar to probe 91 infrastructure projects in the Cordillera region with slippages, which they said “compromise the quality of the projects” and “lessen their projected economic life for the welfare of the public.”
In a letter to Villar, Salvador Liked of the Volunteers Against Corruption said 56 major infra projects have slippages—defined as the difference between the expected price of a project and the price at which the project is executed—of more than 15 percent.
Thirty-five other projects have a slippage of 0.01 to 14.99 percent, Liked added, “casting doubt on whether or not the projects were able to comply with the standard quality of the projects, to avoid the institution of repairs on the pavements and other components of the defective infrastructure projects.”
The infrastructure projects are part of the 2016 work program of the Department of Public Works and Highways for the Cordillera, the VAC official said. Slippages were determined based on the individual status reports of the projects prepared by various monitoring teams of the department.
Liked called on Villar to use the reports to gauge the performance of contractors in the region so those that incurred slippage should no longer be awarded projects to implement in the 2017 national budget.
“Bad performing contractors should no longer be allowed to participate in future biddings or should not be allowed to be awarded projects this year because the slippage that they have incurred could be traced to their political benefactors, who demand from them excessive fees in exchange for the projects awarded to them through alleged rigged bidding,” he stressed.
Liked reminded Villar that President Rodrigo Duterte has said politicians should not meddle in the bidding and implementation of government projects. “Thus, people should now be brave enough in reporting those politicians, especially congressmen, who continue to interfere in the bidding of projects so that their anointed contractors will be the ones to get the awards,” he added.
VAC attached a list of projects in the letter to the DPWH chief that include road improvement work, bridge work, and other infrastructure jobs.