Government’s 4PS still fraught with irregularities – COA

MANILA, Philippines - The government’s cash dole-out scheme for the poor was still fraught with irregularities under the current administration, particularly in the release of funds through the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), a Commission on Audit (COA) report showed.

In a 2012 report, state auditors said double entries in the database or payroll of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) for 2012 totaling P17.4 million resulted in excess transfer of payroll funds and in overpayment of grants of P8.7 million.

Records showed duplication of names of 4,443 household beneficiaries for the payroll period of January to August 2012.

The scheme is also known as Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program. The previous Arroyo administration, widely maligned for high level corruption, initiated the CCT program.

“Double entries in the payroll were confirmed by the regional auditors through the submitted regional validation reports and copies of acknowledgement receipts from the audit teams to confirm double payment of grants,” the COA report said.

“The existence of double entries in the payroll resulted in the continuous downloading and accumulation of payroll grants if not refunded,” state auditors added, noting that such findings were raised as early as 2011.

The COA report said an audit team in Barangay Pagsangahan in San Francisco, Quezon was even able to find a 4Ps beneficiary who presented two IDs with different numbers.

State auditors said the problem, if not addressed immediately, would affect the integrity and reliability of DSWD database, which is also used as reference for other government poverty-alleviation programs.

The same COA report also revealed that grants and service fees of P50.1 million were paid to 7,782 households that were not on the list of validated and registered beneficiaries of the National Household Targeting Office.

State auditors said such findings “may be considered irregular and further resulting (in) additional cost to the government in the distribution of CCT.”

“Analysis of the unlisted beneficiaries in the database showed that the sequence of the numbers is within the assigned numbers for a particular local government unit identified as area for selection of poor households, thus may have been issued without proper authority,” the COA report read.

State auditors said further scrutiny revealed that most of the unlisted beneficiaries had been in the 4Ps system since it began in 2008.

But the DSWD informed the audit team that 7,762 of the beneficiaries had been accounted for and put on active status.

The COA report said concerned officials should explain the deletion and reactivation of some 4Ps beneficiaries as well as the inclusion of names with doubtful data. – With Rainier Allan Ronda