SENATE HEARING In this 2018 photo, TV host Ben Tulfo and his sister, then Tourism Secretary Wanda Tulfo Teo, appear before a hearing of the Senate blue ribbon committee on the controversial advertising deal by the Department of Tourism with government-run PTV Network. The ads were placed on “Kilos Pronto,” a program produced and co-hosted by Tulfo. —INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — Six years after the Commission on Audit (COA) questioned the controversial advertising placement deal between television network PTV Network Inc. (PTNI) and Ben Tulfo’s Bitag Media Unlimited Inc. (BMUI), the state-run television network has yet to return to the government the P75.8 million in disallowed ad payments.
This was according to the 2022 COA report on PTNI, which runs the government-owned PTV Network.
The report stressed that the two notices of suspension issued against the deal back in 2018 — covering P60 million and P15.8 million — already ripened into notices of disallowance (ND).
The issuance of the ND meant that the disallowed payments should be returned to the government as the questioned transaction was deemed either irregular, excessive, or illegal.
PTNI executives, however, had appealed the disallowances and are still awaiting a decision on their plea.
To recall, a deal had been struck between the Department of Tourism (DOT), then headed by Secretary Wanda Tulfo Teo, and PTNI to air P120 million worth of ads of which 75 percent, or P89.9 million, went to “Kilos Pronto,” a news program on PTV produced by BMUI and hosted by Teo’s brothers Ben and Erwin Tulfo.
No MOA
The COA flagged this ad contract in 2018, saying that there was no memorandum of agreement (MOA) between PTNI and Bitag to air DOT ads on “Kilos Pronto.”
With no MOA stating terms and conditions, the COA said “there was also no basis for the computations” on how the questioned payments were determined.
But by the time the advertising deal was questioned, PTNI had already paid P60 million to BMUI in 2017 for the placements on “Kilos Pronto” and P15.8 million the next year.
The Field Investigation Office of the Ombudsman also looked into the deal between PTNI and Ben Tulfo’s company in 2018 because of a lack of supporting documents. They alleged in their complaint that Teo, her brother Ben, PTV general manager Dino Apolinario, and three more conspired to favor Bitag Media.
“The acts of DOT and PTV officials were geared to a common goal to favor Bitag Media to advertise DOT tourism ads and eventually got almost 75 percent of the P120 million pesos branding the projects of the DOT,” the resolution read in part.
The public outcry that followed COA’s findings eventually prompted Teo to resign on May 8, 2018.
A month later on June 5, the COA issued a “notice of disallowance” for the payments, which meant that the payments had to be returned to the government.
Defiant
Ben Tulfo, however, was defiant and said, “We will return nothing.”
He said there was no wrongdoing because BMUI had talked exclusively with PTNI about the tourism advertisements and did not discuss anything with the DOT. He even said that PTNI still owed his company an unspecified amount.
During the hearings with the Senate blue ribbon committee in August 2018, Teo, a staunch supporter of former President Rodrigo Duterte, denied knowing beforehand that “Kilos Pronto’’ was connected to her brother. She even said that they were not close.
She also said that all allegations hurled at her were “incredible.” She claimed she had “diligently fulfilled the mandate” as tourism secretary and that the ad deal with PTNI had gone through proper channels.
The Tulfos got a reprieve in October 2021 when Samuel Martires, the Ombudsman appointed by Duterte after Conchita Carpio Morales’ term ended, cleared them of graft.
The resolution approved by Martires said there was no probable cause to charge the siblings “for conspiring with one another in giving unwarranted benefits” to BMUI through “Kilos Pronto.”
“Records show that DOT Secretary Teo was not in any way privy to the contract entered into between PTV/PTNI and BMUI (Bitag) relative to the DOT tourism promotional advertisement,” the Ombudsman said.
But while the Tulfos have been cleared, PTNI remains on the hook for P75.8 million in unsettled audit allowances relating to the controversial advertising deal, accounting for more than half of the agency’s pending payments from disallowances worth P128.6 million as of Dec. 31, 2022.
Of this, the agency said, “P5.059 million [was] already covered by Notice of Finality of Decision, P123.523 million [is] on appeal (including the payments to Tulfo), P30,000 for salary deduction and P500 was uncollected disallowance from a deceased employee,” it said.
The Inquirer has reached out to PTV for comment on the COA’s latest report, but it has yet to respond at press time.