House will probe DepEd 'anomalies'

CEBU, Philippines - The House of Representatives is set to conduct an investigation into the alleged irregularities of the conduct of the bidding for P17 million worth of armchairs, desks and teacher’s tables by the Bids and Awards Committee of the Department of Education-Cebu Province.

The office of Akbayan Party-List Rep. Risa Hontiveros informed The Freeman that they already got the details of the alleged irregularities here as basis of the resolution that will be filed next week.

The filing of the resolution was reportedly delayed due to the discussion on the proposed charter change.

The resolution of Rep. Hontiveros will call for an investigation in aid of legislation of the alleged irregularities committed by the members of the BAC of DepEd.

A staff of Rep. Hontiveros, Tetay Mendoza told The Freeman that the news report on the sub-standard armchairs, desk and teachers tables got the attention of the congresswoman, being an advocate of quality education.

The investigation will not only cover alleged sub-standard school furniture, but also the allegations of promotion for sale among public school teachers.

The office of Rep. Hontiveros also received reports of alleged irregularities of the DepEd-Cebu province on the purchase of textbooks, construction of school buildings and purchase of materials for Information Technology.

These alleged irregularities were discovered by the auditors of the Commission on Audit.

The Freeman reported early this month that parents and teachers complained about the sub-standard school furniture that were delivered to their areas.

These were part of the 2007 school furniture project of DepEd-Cebu Province.

It was also learned that the project was awarded to Gala Industries, Inc., which was the third lowest bidder.

The company was reportedly awarded the supply contract after the two lowest bidders – JEC Lumber and Ramagal Sash – were disqualified.

The two companies were disqualified for allegedly submitting defective papers, false information and for poor performance in previous projects.

The issue on “promotion for sale” was brought up by Provincial Board Member Victor Maambong during their session when they tackled the matter on school furniture.

Records also show that in Cebu Province 26 units of school buildings with a total cost of P13,115,866.25 were not finished or have been abandoned by the contractors.

In the Division of Lapu-Lapu City, seven school buildings with a total cost of P4,130,000.00 were reported as completed as per Program of Work, however, deficiencies were noted such as poorly finished walls, roofing which are not painted, ceilings which are not in accordance with specifications, windows with no jalousies, an uninstalled electrical wires and fixtures.

The Commission on Audit-Central Office also discovered that information and multi-media equipment packages costing at least P667.95 million were neither utilized nor maximized for classroom instruction in 13 Regions because they were either defective or distributed to schools which were not strictly selected in accordance with the approved criteria resulting in the wasteful storage of utilization of the units.

The same audit report also noted that acute classroom shortages in 2,929 schools were not addressed because school building projects (DPWH) costing at least P597,796 million were implemented in 1,329 school sites which have the least need for school buildings or classrooms. —/NLQ (THE FREEMAN)