CEBU City’s disbursements relative to the Supplementary Feeding Program, amounting to P22.6 million is under close scrutiny by the Commission on Audit (COA) after discovering that many of the purchases for supplies were gotten from middlemen instead of legitimate suppliers.
COA discovered that the Cebu City government bought P12.9 million worth of supplies for the SFP of the Department of Social Welfare and Services (DSWS) from Virgilio and Elsa General Merchandise, which apparently is not a legitimate supplier but rather, only get their supplies from other suppliers.
Auditors who visited the bodega of Virgilio and Elsa General Merchandise found out that there were no stockpiles of goods inside. Moreover, the bodega was located in an inaccessible area of Barangay Cabancalan, Mandaue City. The establishment likewise failed to deliver goods for two weeks, which should have been done daily for the SFP.
These findings made COA question the credentials of the establishment as a legitimate supplier of goods.
“Virgilio and Elsa General Merchandise was the lone bidder, which bid was declared by the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) as a Single Calculated and Responsive Bid (SCRB), as contained in a BAC resolution dated December 11, 2014, and was awarded the contract in the amount of P12,915,010,” the COA report stated.
Auditors said that the supplier had an establishment at the Carbon Public Market, but the business permit revealed that the supplier did not have a display of food items in the public market.
Auditors further cited that an audit of the city’s transactions also disclosed that the city procured monobloc chairs and tables from the same supplier aside from food items.
“However, no stocks on display for monobloc chairs and tables were found during the visit,” COA said.
Thus, COA concluded that this supplier is only a middleman posing as legitimate suppliers and got their stocks from other business establishments.
Supervision
Meanwhile, COA also said that there was a lack of supervision in the implementation of the SFP.
DSWS disclosed that the schedule of getting food items from the supplier was done every Thursday by the City Nutritional Scholars (CNS) or the Day Care Workers in the barangay, who at the same time are tasked to monitor the implementation of the program in the daycare centers in the city.
“However, during the conduct of inspection of selected daycare centers revealed that some daycare centers did not hold classes and consequently did not implement the feeding program while other daycare centers, which held classes also did not implement the feeding program,” COA said.
COA also found that the city’s disbursements amounting to P9.6 million relative to the payment of food for daycare or home-based preschoolers feeding program for the year 2015 lacked supporting documents.
The City Legal Office said, in line with COA’s observation, that there will now be a strict implementation of the guidelines covering the SFP. They will also take measures to strengthen the supervision in the implementation of the program.
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