The Commission on Audit has flagged the Department of Public Works and Highways for delayed, suspended, terminated and unimplemented infrastructure projects worth P73.351billion under the Duterte administration’s “Build, Build, Build” program.
State auditors called the attention of the DPWH for failure to accomplish its targeted projects that even cost the government millions in bank fees.
In a 2017 audit report, CoA said the delay and non-implementation of projects resulted in a very low utilization of funds for the department that cost P27.647 million in commitment fees to banks.
“This indicates that management was not able to effectively manage the increasing amount of funds entrusted to the agency due to low physical delivery of target project and activities,” the report read.
At least 2,334 projects worth P62.588 billion were not completed within specific contract time, while 135 projects worth P6.073 billion had been suspended.
On the other hand, 15 projects worth P2.104 billion were terminated, and 815 projects worth P2.584 billion were not implemented.
The commission advised the DPWH to review the contracts, charge contractors for the delayed projects, terminate contracts and blacklist erring contractors.
Also, the CoA said the DPWH failed to charge contractors damages in 120 delayed projects amounting to P6.665 billion.
The multitrillion-peso “Build, Build, Build” program is a centerpiece program of President Rodrigo Duterte to transform the Philippines into a high-middle income economy by 2022, create job opportunities and trigger trillions of pesos in investments.
According to the audit report, the delays and non-implementation of projects resulted in a low utilization of billions of funds, causing some of it to be invalidated and returned to the national treasury.
In 2017, the DWPH was allotted P662.690 billion but it only obligated P610.933 billion.
The total unobligated amount of P51.757 billion was reverted back to the treasury.
Only P222.661 billion or 33.6 percent of the total budget allocation of P610.933 billion was disbursed or spent.
The DPWH ended up paying P27.647 million in commitment fees to banks, “which is disadvantageous to the government.
“Analysis of the utilization of loan proceeds of the above-listed foreign-assisted projects revealed that the commitment fees were incurred due to low disbursement rate of loan proceeds in calendar year 2017,” CoA said.