Blue ribbon panel to probe into other gov’t transactions – Sotto

Senate President Vicente “Tito” Sotto III (INQUIRER PHOTO / NINO JESUS ORBETA)

MANILA, Philippines — The Senate blue ribbon  committee will continue its probe into other alleged anomalous transactions of the government.

Senate President Vicente “Tito” Sotto III, during the Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum on Wednesday, said the blue ribbon committee will continue probing into other reported anomalies surrounding government transactions.

“It will continue. The blue ribbon’s probe will continue into other anomalous transactions or accountability of any public officers. That is precisely the reason that the blue ribbon was created, to look at the accountability of public officials,” Sotto said partly in Filipino. 

Apart from flood control projects, farm to market road (FMR) projects surfaced during recent Senate hearings after Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian revealed that over P10 billion worth of FMRs programmed under the 2023 and 2024 national budgets have been “extremely overpriced.”

One project, for example, cost 23 times more than the standard price set by the DPWH while others saw markups of up to 70 percent, further bloating the project cost.

Agriculture Secretary Francisco Laurel Jr., meanwhile, said the DPWH set a P15,000 per meter standard cost for FMRs, but this could go as low as P10,000 if the “30 percent” markup was trimmed. /gsg