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Friday, March 29, 2024

COA grills QC on P479M in purchases

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The Commission on Audit (COA) has questioned the validity of P479 million worth of COVID-19 pandemic procurements, mostly relief food packs, made by the Quezon City government.

In a new report published on the COA website, state auditors said the Quezon City government’s purchases violated the Procurement Law and its implementing regulations, as well as accounting rules.

“Payments…were not supported with complete documentation…Thus the validity and regularity of the transactions cannot be ascertained,” the commission said.

Party-list Rep. Mike Defensor (Anakalusugan), who is running for Quezon City mayor, said the COA report bolstered his previous whistleblowing on “the overpriced food pack purchases made by Mayor Joy Belmonte.”

“Mayor Belmonte has not sufficiently explained the procurements, conveniently dismissing our whistleblowing as politically-motivated. Now the COA itself is questioning the transactions,” Defensor said.

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A concerned citizen earlier filed plunder charges against Belmonte with the Office of the Ombudsman in connection with the purchases.

Belmonte has yet to react to the report as of press time.

The COA report said that the P479 million worth of procurements were not supported by “details of the quantity (of food aid) received by each beneficiary,” procurement plan, and proof of online posting of notice of award, contract, or purchase order.

“Likewise, the posting and reporting requirements…were not complied with,” the COA said.

The P479 million was part of appropriations under the Bayanihan to Heal as One Law approved by Congress. The Department of Budget and Management released the money to the Quezon City government on April 7, 2020.

Of the P479 million, the city government spent P385 million on food packs, P84.7 million on rice and plastic bags, and P9.4 million on noodles, according to the COA report.

The report said the city also violated accounting rules by treating the fund release as internal revenue allotment or local share of national taxes, instead of subsidy from the national government. The city later rectified its error.

Defensor previously claimed that the city government had overpriced the food packs by as much as P514 each, resulting in the loss of millions of pesos in taxpayers’ money.

The local government spent P1,149.98 for each food pack. However, an itemized canvass made by Defensor’s staff showed that the contents of each pack could have been bought at no more than P636 from local supermarkets.

The purchases were also split in violation of procurement and auditing rules, Defensor said.

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