SOME 155 consultants and 82 people under contract were paid more than P3.4 million a month over a nine-month period by the former chairman of the National Anti-Poverty Commission, Joel Rocamora, documents obtained by the Manila Standard showed.
The number of workers was larger than the total organic internal staff hired during Rocamora’s tenure at the commission.
NAPC Chairman Liza Maza had already terminated the services of Rocamora’s consultants in two separate memorandum orders after President Rodrigo Duterte’s order to remove all holdover officials from the previous administration.
Over the nine-month period, the NAPC distributed the 155 consultants to 11 departments inside the commission, and paid them monthly or in tranches.
Some consultants were paid from as low as P25,000 while others received as much as P540,000 within the period, averaging about P3.4 million a month.
Total fees paid to consultants within the nine-month period total to about P30.6 million or about 15.4 percent of the NAPCs annual budget.
Among the highest paid consultants by the NAPC were: Buboy Magahis (P540,000) who was assigned to the POI-ISF, Elizabeth Yang (P405,000) who was assigned to the GAD, Emelita Oro and Francisco Gonzal, both paid P489,875 as output-based consultants, Mylene Mission (P480,000) who was assigned at the LACMS, Ma. Venerandra Nunes Nachura (P450,000) who was assigned at the LACMS, and Ermin Palao (P480,000) who was assigned at the LACMS.
Maza also canceled the contracts of service with 82 consultants, noting that their number had bloated, particularly in the last six years.
Terminated COS employees are provided with option to re-apply, with possible rehiring after evaluation.
Maza had earlier questioned Rocamora’s hiring of consultants, asking why a small agency needed so many consultants, who outnumbered its internal staff.
“This is an insult to NAPC’s mandate to serve the interest of the poor,” Maza said.
Maza is pursuing options for regularizing contractual employees who have served for extended period in the agency.