UN stops direct payments to AFP

MANILA, Philippines - The United Nations has decided to stop direct remittances of peacekeeping funds to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in the wake of alleged abuses and corruption in the use of such funds.

Consul Elmer Cato of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) told a joint hearing of the House committees on defense and appropriations that from now on, the UN would remit millions of dollars in peacekeeping funds to the national treasury through the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.

Following the UN decision, Cato said the DFA has turned over to the treasury some $3.3 million (more than P120 million) in remittances that the department refused to forward to the AFP in 2008 because of the plunder case of former military comptroller Carlos Garcia.

The Ombudsman filed plunder charges against Garcia who was accused of illegally amassing P303 million in military funds.

Members of the two House committees welcomed the UN decision to remit to the treasury reimbursements for costs the AFP incurs in maintaining contingents in UN peacekeeping missions abroad.

Cavite Rep. Joseph Emilio Abaya, appropriations committee chairman, said the decision is consistent with the budget law, which provides that all government receipts be remitted to the national treasury.

He said the AFP should just ask the Department of Budget and Management for funds needed by its peacekeepers.

He chided the DFA for exercising “selective discretion” in withholding UN remittances.

He said the $3.3 million that the DFA withheld in the wake of corruption allegations in the military was actually just a small part of the $66 million (more than P2 billion) that the UN paid directly to the AFP between 1999 and 2010.

Abaya’s defense committee counterpart Muntinlupa Rep. Rodolfo Biazon, a former chief of staff of the military, said the AFP violated the budget law by not remitting the UN payments to the treasury.

“Who authorized you to violate the GAA (General Appropriations Act)?” he asked.

None of the several defense and military officials who attended the hearing could answer, saying it happened before their time.

Biazon said by keeping the funds, the AFP exercised “a lot of discretion” on the use of the money.

He also said the AFP decision in 2003 to transfer UN remittances from the Land Bank of the Philippines to the United Coconut Planters Bank was questionable.

The committee has learned that it was Garcia, then AFP comptroller, who made the decision to transfer the funds.

During the hearing, DFA Assistant Secretary Lesli Gatan confirmed a report in The STAR on Tuesday that the UN has denied making a $5-million reimbursement to the AFP in January 2001 as alleged by former government auditor Heidi Mendoza.

The two committees also learned that the AFP had frustrated efforts by the Commission on Audit (COA) to examine disbursements from UN remittances and funds provided by the US government for joint US-RP military exercises.

“We tried to audit these funds, but they could not provide us with documents, including a detailed list of expenses from these funds, despite repeated requests,” COA Assistant Commissioner Lourdes Castillo said.

House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman said it is important that the funds be audited “since there could be cases of double charging or bloating of expenses.”