MANILA, Philippines — More delays are likely on the distribution of the government’s massive cash aid program for the poor by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), which warned the second tranche of aid may not get released on time.
The admission from Social Welfare Undersecretary Glen Paje on Thursday adds to the woes facing the agency tasked by President Duterte to spearhead the government’s P205-billion social amelioration program. It now appears more likely that not all of 17.96 million families will get their cash by month's end, a month and a half into the Luzon lockdown and weeks into localized quarantine in other parts of archipelago.
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That said, Paje was clear not to hold DSWD accountable, as he said in a briefing that local government units (LGUs) are responsible for reaching the targeted households by April 30. As of Wednesday, 8 p.m., only 31.7% or 5.8 million families have been directly assisted by funds cumulatively worth P27.9 billion.
“We want to make it clear that LGUs will be accountable and responsible on the proper and timely distribution of aid. If LGUs will not complete the distribution of aid, DSWD will be forced to hold the next tranche of funds,” Paje said in Filipino.
For this month, DSWD is spending the first half— or P105 billion— released by the budget department early this month to fund its cash aid project that grants between P5,000 and P8,000 each family, depending on regional location.
The second half of that funding, which will finance subsidies for May, is already in DSWD's hands, but Paje said the agency may opt not to release it without proper liquidation of cash spent in April. “LGUs have 15 days from completion of payout to submit a report of checks or report of disbursement,” he said.
These reports, in turn, will form part of auditing of taxpayers’ money by the Commission on Audit, together with refunds for money which may end up not getting used.
Refunds to be returned
The cash aid program, crafted to assist the poor staying in their homes during quarantine, has two sets of recipients. First are the easily identifiable 4.4 million household beneficiaries of the flagship conditional cash transfer program, 3.7 million of whom holding cash cards received their aid mere days after the program was announced.
Those at the waiting end, however, were larger at 13.56 million households, whom DSWD relies on the LGUs to identify. Problems hit the identification process because DSWD set a cap on the number of beneficiaries per each city or municipality, limits which did not match to the number of in-need families listed by LGUs.
Another problem that caused delay in cash distribution was DSWD validation if beneficiaries were indeed qualified to get subsidy in the first place. Last week, this process was set aside until after cash disbursement is completed. If it would turn out later on that some recipients were not qualified, Paje said LGUs, not the beneficiaries, should refund DSWD.
“Any refunds should also be returned to DSWD for proper accounting. Any discrepancies that will be noted will be investigated and LGUs will be liable administratively, civilly, and criminally,” he said.
Apart from the P27.9 billion already with households, Paje said around P65.5 billion was yet to be distributed by LGUs. This indicates that another P11.7 billion from the first tranche was still with DSWD and yet to be downloaded to LGUs.