COA flags NBI for failure to acquire equipment, set up laboratories
MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Audit (COA) has flagged the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) for its failure to complete projects involving the acquisition of state-of-the-art equipment and the setting up forensic and scientific laboratories.
Of the eight acquisitions programmed in 2018 using the funds retained from clearance and other fees collected by NBI amounting to ₱244,500,000.00, only one or 12.5 percent was completed as of December 31, 2018.
COA also called out the NBI for utilizing only 57.29 percent or P33,354,149.40 of the requested fund received from Department of Budget Management (DBM), which amounted to ₱58,224,616.00
“Hence, [this] resulted in the lapsing [or] reversal of NCA (notice of cash allocation) to the BTr (Bureau of Treasury) amounting to P24,870,466.60,” COA’s report read.
State auditors asked the NBI to “review, identify and address the cause of delays in the procurement and payment process of the Bureau.”
Planned activities not implemented
COA also said that the NBI only implemented five out of its 13 planned or programmed activities with an allocated budget amounting to P118,113,460.36
The five activities were implemented at a total cost of P87,966,778.71 or 74.48 percent of the total budget allocation.
State auditors recommended that the NBI management “furnish the Office of the Auditor with [a] narrative report on the outcome of the implemented projects with a detailed breakdown of expenditures.”
It also asked the NBI to conduct Gender and Development-related activities “that are implementable to maximize the use of allocated budget for GAD related activities.” (Editor: Eden Estopace)
