PCSO gradually trimming intelligence, PR funds, solons told

PCSO chairman Margarita Juico INQUIRER FILE PHOTO LYN RILLON

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) was gradually decreasing its intelligence and PR funds, its officials told lawmakers on Thursday.

During the second day of the House committee on appropriations’ deliberations on the proposed P2.268 trillion national budget, PCSO general manager Jose Ferdinand Rojas II said that their intelligence funds were down to P10 million this year and would continue to reduce the said funds in 2014.

The present funding was much lower than the P364 million intelligence funds of the PCSO during the Arroyo administration.

During the time of the Aquino administration, Rojas said that the chairperson of the PCSO and the general manager were each allotted only P5 million for their intelligence funds.

“But we only used P3 million from each of these intelligence funds,” he told Cagayan de Oro Representative Rufus Rodriguez.

Under its reorganization program, the PCSO was also reducing the number of its employees from its earlier 2,200-strong manpower down to 1,724.

The PCSO’s budget for advertisements were also lower in the current administration, said Rojas, who pegged the present PR funding to be around P275 million.

The reduction was significant, he said, as the PR budget back in 2010 had been pegged at between P1.7 billion and P1.8 billion.

Rojas said the PCSO would continue to allocate P275 million for its advertisements and said that they might even decrease their PR funding in 2014.

“We are decreasing this year by year. We use these funds to create awareness and provide the public with information on how to get medical and health-related assistance,” he said.

When asked by Rodriguez if the PCSO could decrease the P275 million PR budget some more, Rojas said that it was necessary for the agency to put “buffer” funding because of “payables from the past.”

“A lot of our suppliers keep coming to our office to keep accounts from 2006 to 2010 paid. We are in the direction of reducing the PR budget but we have to have that buffer every year,” said the PCSO general manager.