City's negligence resulted to wastage of P87M public money
The city government merely ignored the recommendation made by the Commission on Audit (COA) last year relative to the mothballed Iloilo City Socialized Housing Project in Pavia, Iloilo.
Because of said negligence, COA noted that the city government put into waste some P87 million used in the initial implementation of the said project.
In the 2005 COA audit report, the commission stated that the city government must take immediate action on the city housing project to avoid further loss of funds and deterioration of the project.
The same report urged the city government to set up a committee to undertake a study on the existing project condition to make sure that whatever action is taken will benefit the city government.
Based on the evaluation report of the COA's Technical Service Office (TSO), the city's housing project gobbled up a total of P87,098.092.73 as disclosed in the total value of work accomplishment made by the Ace Builders and Enterprise.
The figure is based on the corrected contract qualities and unit cost including cost of additional works. The evaluation report is dated November 16, 2005.
The result of the TSO inspection report was forwarded to the city government for appropriate action. The City Legal Office (CLO) gave the assurance that appropriate action will be taken by the city government on the project. However, no concrete action has been taken.
The P87,098,092.73 is equivalent to 61.70 percent of the total revised project cost amounting to P137,787,499.56. The computed amount was based on the documents submitted by the City Engineer's Office (CEO) to the commission.
The housing project started in April 2001 at the original contract cost of P125,304,356.65. The project was made thru a bond flotation scheme during the administration of former Mayor Mansueto Malabor. The project was discontinued due to alleged anomalies, substandard materials and reported deficiencies upon inspection.
Previous and some members of the present Sangguniang Panlungsod were already required by the Ombudsman Visayas to submit their counter-reply on their alleged participation in the housing scandal. Even Mayor Jerry Treñas was asked by Ombudsman Visayas to give his side. However, until now nothing new was heard of the Ombudsman investigation.
The use of substandard materials was made public by project subcontractor Rudy Gonzalez after the ABE failed to pay him of the contracted number of constructed housing units.
The ABE reported an accomplishment of 73.88 percent and has already claimed P62,599,557.69 (P67,328,801.66 less taxes of P4,729,243.97) at the time when the project was stopped.
Moreover, the ABE ignored the order of the CEO to resume work on September 23, 2002. Since then, the uncompleted buildings remained unattended and were exposed to elements resulting in their deterioration.
The audit report also said that last February 16, 2006, the CEO submitted additional documents to COA and again requested COA-TSO for a joint re-evaluation and inspection of the housing project.
The same COA audit report recommended that the city government should require the contractor to justify satisfactorily the deficiency of P5,524,087.60 otherwise deduct the amount from the total value of work accomplished.