Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippimes—Senator Mirriam Defensor-Santiago on Wednesday called for a probe on the Department of Social Welfare and Development, alleging that it gets “massive funding increases for its conditional cash transfer (CCT) program.
Santiago, in her submitted resolution, cited the Philippine Daily Inquirer’s September 3 report on the Philippine Postal Corporation accumulating P5 billion in unliquidated cash advances from DSWD.
The cash transfers were meant for distribution to a million beneficiaries of the CCT.
She also cited in her resolution a Commission on Audit report that the P5 billion unliquidated cash obtained by Philpost is ten times bigger than the P500 million it incurred just in 2012.
“DSWD has long been criticized for massive funding increases for its CCT program in the past four years despite its sorely limited capacity to deploy such huge amounts to millions of beneficiaries over a thousand municipalities and ensure no leakages or pilferage,” the resolution stated.
Philpost is one of DSWD’s outlets for the CCT component of its Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4P’s), which provides cash incentives to encourage marginalized families to send their children to school and participate in community development.
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