Palma asks Senate to expand PCSO probe

Former Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) chairwoman Cecilia Muñoz Palma asked the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee yesterday to expand its investigation to include even the administration of her predecessor, Manuel Morato.

At the Senate hearing yesterday, the former president of the 1986 Constitutional Commission and former Supreme Court associate justice also defended her board's decisions, including the implementation of the Botika ng Masa that has been criticized by Morato and some sectors. She stressed that all of their decisions were impelled by their crusade for good government.

At the same hearing, Morato charged that the PCSO under Palma and not Malacañang should be blamed for PCSO's failure to respond to the funding requests of some charitable organizations, and for medical assistance to the poor.

In a soft but calm voice, Palma lamented that her peaceful life was torn apart, and the integrity in public service that she had built through the years was viciously attacked.

She said that her cleaning up of the agency might have caused Morato to wage a "barrage of vilification" against her.

The Palma board terminated the PCSO contract with an Australian firm given exclusive rights without bidding to supply PCSO for 12 years its paper requirements for lotto.

"We stopped the payment on the 'PCSO Kindness Program' which involved an P8,888,100 advanced purchase of memorial plans from the Prudential Life Plan without public bidding," she said.

She also claimed that the Morato administration bought 3,396 units of ambulances from KIA Motors and Columbian Motors without bidding. She said that the total cost of P1,283,652,574 was overpriced, with the fund taken from the Charity Fund.

"We terminated a contract with another Australian firm, BABN, for supply also without bidding, for the so-called 'Scratch and Win' sweepstakes tickets, also under grossly disadvantageous terms," she added.

The Palma board also stopped Morato's television series to promote lotto called "Pangarap kong Jackpot." She said this bled the PCSO of P327 million and would have run up to the year 2001. The Office of the Ombudsman, however, dismissed the case filed against Morato over this promotions program for lotto.

Palma lamented that the current PCSO management and others in their company and employees missed the intent of the letter of Sister Christine Tan, former PCSO director. She said that what they bewailed was "the wide gap, the blatant disproportion between the amounts given to the projects of the First Family and those approved for equally deserving beneficiaries, and that funds for regular hospitals and institutions were becoming extremely difficult to secure."

Morato, however, said the Palma board only has itself to blame for this inability. He cited the Palma board's Botika ng Masa and the contributions to the Philippine Tuberculosis Society that rendered the agency incapable of providing funds to regular beneficiaries.

"I categorically state that the failed P500 million Botika ng Masa project with expenditures to date running to over P200 million, and the Philippine Tuberculosis Society, pet project of then Chairman Palma, which received close to P300 million, hampered the medical assistance to the poor," Morato told the Senate committee.

He also charged that all medicines given away by PCSO's Botika ng Masa were bought from three pharmaceutical firms not accredited by the Department of Health, that some of the medicines were obsolete and delisted from the Philippine National Drug Formulate.

Palma admitted that medicines for the Botika project were bought from non-accredited firms.

"This is true because we opted for a bidding process that will be open to as many as there are qualified drug companies and ensure the lowest possible prices for the medicine," she said.

She denied charges that they gave medicines to hospitals whether they needed the medicines or not. She stressed that all requisition forms were based on the lists submitted by the hospitals themselves. She also denied that they had purchased expired medicines.