Including those bought in 2020 yet: P84 million CCMC equipment still unused

CEBU, Philippines — The Cebu City Medical Center has purchased various equipment worth P83.61 million that remain unused, including those bought four years ago, and the City Council wants the hospital’s medical director to explain it and not somebody else.

That is why the legislative body moved to another date the executive session it set for yesterday morning for Dr. Peter Mancao to supposedly shed light on the accumulated donations meant to finish the construction of the medical facility.

The executive session was meant for the resource persons to provide the City Council with updates of the commitments of the private institutions, all the complete plans, terms and reference, updates of all the contracts, updates of all the biddings, and all the Program of Works and Estimates (POWE), among others, of CCMC.

Instead of Mancao, however, it was Atty. Ken Sayrodin, special assistant on legal matters, who showed up.

The City Council, though, wanted Mancao to be the one to give the briefing and answer as well the Commission on Audit (COA) findings about the unutilized equipment.

In their audit report on CCMC transactions for 2023, state auditors said an audit team conducted an onsite inspection in CCMC last March 14 and found the unused equipment.

“(T)here were pieces of equipment which are still unutilized. In response to our letter, the Stock Officer of CCMC submitted a report containing the list of unutilized equipment as of March 31, 2024,” they said.

Section 2 of Presidential Decree 1445 (Government Auditing Code of the Philippines) requires that all resources of the government shall be “managed, expended, or utilized in accordance with law and regulations, and safeguarded against loss or wastage through illegal or improper disposition”.

Among the items that were not utilized and were just stored in CCMC as of Dec.31, 2023, were a delivery room light, anesthesia machine, infant incubator, harmonic instrument set, Medtronic, and a digital radio fluoroscopy system, among others.

These items were procured, delivered, and received by the City Government in 2020 and 2021.

“During our 2021 audit of the CCMC project, some of these uninstalled high-value equipment were already observed but the Audit Team accepted the explanation of the DEPW asserting that these were for installation in a few months' time,” COA said.

The state auditors recommended that the City Government, through the DEPW and the CCMC administration, “coordinate and undertake measures to fast-track the installation and utilization of the said equipment”.

“The Management may prioritize the completion of the areas where the unutilized equipment will be installed,” they further said.

Meanwhile, during the executive session, City Councilor Mary Ann de los Santos pointed out that Mancao was not present.

Sayrodin then manifested his willingness to answer the inquiries about CCMC particularly on the funding donations from private entities gathered by the Cebu Medical Society (CMS) for CCMC, because Mancao had “pressing personal matters that require his immediate attention”.

De los Santos, though, asked if he has a plantilla position with CCMC and he said it is still being processed.

“So, you speaking there is not official? So, how can we get information from somebody who is technically not yet an employee of the Cebu City Government?” she said.

Despite the presence of DEPW’s representative, the City Council decided to move the executive session to Aug. 7, as its members wanted to really hear the updates from Mancao himself. — /RHM (FREEMAN)