MANILA, Philippines—Was the Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund, which was supposed to bankroll projects of farmers and agriculture entrepreneurs, used in the May 2010 elections?
Farmers and cooperatives raised the question on Friday as new revelations on the misuse of the Acef surfaced.
Acef, which was established in 1996 by a law, was funded by tariffs from agricultural products. Acef contained P10.73 billion accumulated from collected tariffs from 1990 to 2010, according to the Department of Agriculture’s February 2011 report. During that period, the fund used P8.85 billion, mostly for grants and loans.
As of February, the DA said, P2.57 billion went to grants, while P5.82 billion went to loans to 299 accounts.
A check of the DA documents on the Acef showed that the bulk of the funds started to be released in 2007, three years before the 2010 elections.
Rodolfo Niones, an official of a cooperative of onion farmers in Nueva Ecija, said the coop applied for Acef loans twice.
In 2001, he said, the coop received P8.5 million “without giving commission.”
When the coop tried to avail of another loan in 2008, the coop was told to give a cut of 18 percent of the loan proceeds.
Niones said the DA regional officer said the money would be used to fund the election bid of a DA official in 2010.
Niones said the coop did not agree. “Our loan was never approved,” he told the INQUIRER.
Gregorio San Diego, a member of the country’s biggest poultry cooperative, said officers of the coop were asked to give a 10 percent “commission” in exchange for the approval of a loan applied for in 2008.
San Diego said coop officers complained to senior DA officials about the kickback deal and the slowness of the loan processing, but were advised to give in. They were told the money “goes beyond the DA.”
Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said his office had received complaints that DA officials processing the loan applications had been asking for a cut of between 10 and 35 percent.
Alcala said that it was difficult to charge officials involved in the Acef scam, noting that all the irregularities were done off the books. He thus urged those who were told to give kickbacks to come out and sign an affidavit.
The militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas urged lawmakers to conduct an inquiry to find out whether the loans and grants from Acef were used for election purposes given the timing of the loan releases.
According to the KMP, the pattern of disbursement was similar to the so-called fertilizer scam, which KMP said saw hundreds of millions of pesos diverted to former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s campaign kitty a few months before the 2004 presidential elections.