Bishop bares ‘questionable transactions’

Cotabato City, Philippines—What has gone wrong with the three-year flood-control program in Mindanao that then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had established through an executive order?

Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo, who heads the Mindanao River Basin Rehabilitation and Development (MRBRD) Task Force (TF), has said during President Aquino’s visit here on Wednesday that such questions should be answered as floods devastated low-lying areas along the path of Rio Grande de Mindanao, including this city and nearby areas of Maguindanao and North Cotabato.

But meantime, he said the focus should be on how to alleviate the woes of the flood victims, numbering 30,000 families in this city alone. The flood-control program, which was established after the 2008 floods here that submerged all the city’s villages, has a budget of P7 billion from 2009 to 2012.

Quevedo said after all the efforts, time and huge investment poured into the heavily silted Cotabato-Agusan river basin to prevent the 2008 flooding from happening again, the “worst flash floods” this month made people wonder what happened to the program.

Quevedo admitted that he has monitored “questionable transactions,” which he declined to make public, and said these were all included in the TF periodic report to the Palace.

The former head of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines has clarified that the TF’s budget goes through the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) regional office in Central Mindanao, which is based in Koronadal City.

Quevedo said the TF has no control over the fund disbursements that started with an initial release of P50 million, followed by P10 million to P30 million in trance releases from the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).

He said his group was only tasked to monitor, evaluate and recommend to the President all MRBRD-related projects.

He said the TF was also mandated to conduct a feasibility study of flood control proposals and a master plan and these will be ready by July. In September 2009, TF executive director Solomon Badoy reported that of the P50 million released by the DBM a month before, only P5 million remained as dredging work continued in Rio Grande de Mindanao. Since then, nothing significant was heard of the dredging operations.

Public Works Secretary Rogelio Singson told reporters here the “realignment of projects” constituted the delay, but was quick to say that the money is now ready.

When asked how much fund was left for the MRBRD projects, the President said it would be best to keep the amount to themselves.

“Some might think and ask for it only to go to waste,” Mr. Aquino said.

The President’s statement elicited adverse comments. “How can there be accountability without transparency?” asked Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao information chief Ali Macabalang.

But Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr., who was here on  Friday to distribute relief items to dislocated families in two evacuation sites, said he was informed by Singson in a phone conversation that the remaining MRBRD fund of P150 million “is safe and intact” in the DPWH account.

“The DPWH is doing well under Singson’s watch,” said Revilla, the Senate public works committee chair, who was here with his wife, Cavite Rep. Lani Mercado, to distribute relief goods.
Meanwhile, some displaced families in one of the city’s most populated evacuation sites have complained of “being excluded from distribution by the DSWD.”

“Since we moved here a week ago, we have not received a pack of rice but other evacuees have more than enough,” said Bai Kadiguia, an evacuee from Barangay Poblacion Mother. Charlie Señase and Edwin Fernandez; with reports from Jeoffrey Maitem and Dennis Jay Santos, Inquirer Mindanao