Wrong numbers: A look into the slashed Capitol budget
Erroneous data. Too much job hires. Absent Capitol chiefs. Put the three together and the result? A slashed Executive Budget for the Iloilo Provincial Government.
Or so it appears with the now controversial cut made by members of the 9th Iloilo Sanggunian Panlalawigan's (SP) Committee on Appropriations.
Forming part of the first pages of the 38-paged committee report, absences of the invited Capitol chiefs of offices marked the committee findings and deliberations. Such followed by the purportedly unprepared ones too including the unidentified department head who was candid enough to report, "he only got the budget of his office the day before the schedule budget hearing of the committee. Still another said that the budget submitted to the Committee was not the budget that her office had previously prepared."
Similar not-so-happy observations and evaluations with data that "were sometimes erroneous" and could not be "satisfactorily explained even by the Local Finance Committee."
The figures referred to unexplained increases in Personnel Services and the Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE).
"The Budget Officer had to re-submit new data which could not still clear the air. Reference in particular is made on the P118,749,407.52 increase of the item of the Salaries and Wages," excerpts of the Committee report went. "The Committee found that these increases could not be explained. It is impossible for the Iloilo Provincial Government to hire regular employees for 2 years paying them a total of P146,462,939.52."
Chaired by Vice Governor Rolex Suplico, the issue of job hires likewise got a major attention with the committee stating how such "has grown by leaps and bounds since 2000."
"What is notable here is that the hiring of job hires violated section 77 of Republic Act 7160 otherwise known as the Local Government Code of 1991. In sum, Section 77 of the Code states that job hires may be hired for local projects approved by the SP for a period not exceeding 6 months. Moreover, the item has been conveniently placed under the MOOE which would exclude it in the computation of the 45% PS cap found in Section 325 (a) of the Code. If this item is placed in the PS, then the 45% will be violated," the report continued.
As such, from proposed expenditures to the approved amount, the proposed budget showed numerous zeroes including words such as "delete" and "reduce."
Special notations were further included in every approved planned expenditure.
For instance, the committee recommended that no applicants in the Capitol shall be hired when his or her relatives within the first degree of consanguinity or affinity is already employed here.
Lastly, the committee moved to take up the province's 20% Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA) Development Fund amounting to over P176 million "including additions thereto arising from budgetary cuts in the PS, MOOE and Capital Outlay after the deliberation of these recommendations."
First District Board Member Richard Garin is the committee's vice chair alongside Third District Board Member Arthur Defensor Jr. Members are Fourth District Board Member George Demaisip and Fifth District Board Member Jesus Salcedo.
As of press time, Second District Board Member June Mondejar remains the sole committee member who failed to sign the report.