A deluge of projects a month before barangay elections

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines—From installing signages, plant boxes and pathways to rehabilitation of barangay (village) halls, project proposals are flying from half of the city’s 138 barangays to be implemented before the upcoming barangay polls in October.

Based on records of the Barangay Affairs Office (BAO), an attached office of the City Mayor’s Office, 69 barangays have submitted project proposals worth P30,000 to P800,000.

BAO chief Hermilo Naputo Jr. said the chairs of 16 barangays that submitted proposals were on their last term but likely to run for barangay councilors.

“The rest are reelectionists,” said Naputo, a former chair of Barangay 77.

He declined to say if the apparent rush in the submission of proposals was for the prospective candidates to win votes or to raise funds out of the “SOP” being given by the contractors of the projects.

Asked if he found it unusual or suspicious that his office was flooded with proposed projects with the barangay elections just over a month away, Naputo said the role of his office was just to receive the barangays’ initiatives.

“Of course, we cannot question their motives for submitting their proposed projects at this time. We just accept these proposed projects and forward these documents to the City Engineering Office (CEO) and later to the Office of the City Administrator (OCM),” Naputo said.

The CEO prepares the programs of work of the proposed projects, then endorses these to the OCM for approval. The projects will be financed from its

20% development funds

Elizabeth Lesiguez, chair of Barangay 109-A which has one of the biggest funding allocations at P300,000, dismissed the speculations.

“We have our honorarium. We don’t accept that SOP or whatever. If ever the contractor has something to give us, we will just ask him to add it to our project,” Lesiguez said.

She submitted a project for road reblocking, which, she said, would start this week. She said she decided to implement the project to beat the deadline on projects with the barangay elections approaching.

Lesiguez acknowledged that she would run again for a possible third term as chair of her village, which has more than 18,000 residents, 2,700 of them registered voters.

The Commission on Elections has imposed a ban on the implementation of barangay projects from Oct. 18 to Oct. 28, the day of the elections.