The Man Behind Argao's Technology Innovation

The IT genius, Querubin “Ben” Momongan, is the present consultant for the Philippine Local Automation Project in the town of Argao.

A Carolininian, Ben gained a Bachelor of Arts degree in the University of San Carlos in Cebu City in 1970.

With over 35 years of expertise in the field of Information Technology, Ben has offered consulting and system integration solution in the field of retail banking, private banking, workflow and imaging and contact center with digital relationship business and turnkey design and implementation of emerging technology solutions as his focal point.

Apart from our country where he first worked, Ben has a broad management expertise, as well as international experience in several foreign countries such as the United States of America, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Canada and some neighboring countries like China, Malaysia and Singapore.

For 24 long, productive years, he worked and broadened his experiences abroad as bank consultant. He also worked as project manager, executive director, program director and managing consultant in several prestigious international companies such as Burroughs Asia Ltd, in Beijing China; Unisys China/Hongkong Ltd, Hongkong; Headstrong—The Global Consulting Company in Hongkong, GKL Consultiing HK/MY Ltd—Global Knowledge Leader in Malaysia and the Odyssey Financial Technologies in Singapore.

It was only in 2002 when he finally returned to his much-loved hometown Argao and engaged in farming industry.

Last year, however, Mayor Edsel Galeos, whom he described as his very good friend and childhood mate, asked his help for the anticipated automation of Argao.

The good mayor, Ben disclosed, believes that the only way for Argao to become progressive is through automation.

“I agreed but I told him I want to offer my services for free,” a smiling Ben said.

And so last October 7, 2007, Mayor Galeos signed a Memorandum of Agreement appointing Ben as Argao’s IT consultant.

Challenges, however, came his way when Argao, as a second class town, somehow experienced budgetary constraints for the proposed automation project.

Nevertheless, the IT genius was able to get around the problem and pushed through with the project by recruiting different employees from the various departments of Argao.

 “I cannot buy hardware nor hire people from outside,” Ben said, adding that this however, did not discourage him but rather motivated him.

“So what I did was I assembled all the machines, built a new office and got 28 people from the internal departments and trained them for three months,” he said.

Oddly enough, Ben was able to develop six programmers and 22 encoders. And with their help, he was able to install 12 applications and is developing six more. By the end of this year, he plans to install 18 applications for the entire municipality.

Through his initiative, Argao was able to develop a budget and disbursement system. Last January, the town was able to install and implement the business permit licensing system that guarantees only an hour release of the business permit from the time of application.

He is also the man behind Argao’s ambitious implementation of the Local Broadband Network (LBN). By means of this, the town hopes to provide free wireless internet connections to the 45 barangays in the municipality.

 “By the end of September, we are planning to provide wireless internet connections for the 13 coastal barangays in Argao,” Ben disclosed. As a matter of fact, the implementation of the local broadband network already started last Monday with the help of the municipality’s IT personnel.

Besides the free internet connection to all of the barangays, a plan on the implementation of surveillance cameras all over the town will also be developed. The cameras would be of great help to the town most especially in terms of monitoring their peace and order situation.

Further, a telephone system will also be put up that would allow the Argaowanons to avail of free international calls to the US and Canada. Moreover, should the LBN be implemented, the town will also develop a tax system that would provide convenience and efficiency to taxpayers. This means, according to Ben, that the taxpayers can pay their taxes in their respective barangays without having to go to the town hall.

Ben hopes that Argao, through its giant leap for technology, would serve as a model not only to the entire Cebu province but to the world as a whole.

“We are trying to be an example to the rest of the world. We want them to know that it is not impossible to develop all of these, nga mahimo gyud diay ni nato. If the first world countries can do this, then Argao can do this also,” Ben remarked.

With the different IT projects being implemented and planned for Argao, Ben proudly tells the whole world that the town will soon be able to compete with other areas that are technolo-gically advanced.