COA questions 2 CHED contracts

A single supplier-contractor bagged the Commission on Higher Education’s P300-million call center laboratory development project and the P122.5-million supply contract to purchase library books for state universities and colleges (SUCs).

The two contracts were questioned by the Commission on Audit (COA).

Acting CHED chairman Romulo Neri said the P550-million special allotment release order for the two projects was released to CHED when he was secretary of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) in 2006.

“I think it’s something worth looking into because there was only one supplier for the two projects,” he said.

The P300-million Integrated Multi-Site Business Process Outsourcing-Integrated Contact Centers (BPO-ICC) project was bagged by a four company consortium comprised of E-Services Global Solutions Inc. (ESGS), Drishti Philippines Inc. (DPI), Information Transmission Computer Control Inc. (ITCC), and Hillmarc’s Construction Corp. (HCC).

HCC, as the contractor of the building component of the project, had taken up much of the P300 million contract when then acting CHED chairman Dr. Carlito S. Puno made revisions to the project to involve the construction of a single-floor call center building at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines in Manila to serve as the project’s command center.

Original plans for the BPO-ICC stipulated the mere retrofit or renovation of existing structures in the six SUCs to be covered by the project to house the call center training laboratories.

The five other SUCs covered by the BPO-ICC are the Laguna State Polytechnic University, the Pangasinan State University, Technological University of the Philippines, Tarlac State University, and Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University. 

The COA had questioned the memorandum of agreement signed by Puno as CHED acting chairman with the Philippine Association of State Universities and Colleges (PASUC) for the purchase of the unnecessary library books for a supposed income generating project (IGP) that were exclusively distributed by Trinitas Publishing.

Under the supposed IGP, libraries of the different SUCs were supposed to rent out the books to students.

However, COA said library books were not required or prescribed textbooks.

It was learned that P100 million of the P122.5 million cost of the library books purchase was taken from CHED’s Higher Education Development Fund of P550 million that was released by DBM for income generating projects.

The P550 million SARO was released to CHED for wide distribution to SUCs nationwide so they can undertake revenue generating projects that will make them less dependent on subsidy from the national government, Neri said. – Rainier Allan Ronda