COA questions Biliran’s loan

The Commission on Audit (COA) is faulting the provincial government of Biliran for loaning R30 million to bankroll its priority projects when it could have saved R10 million by withdrawing P40 million from its time deposits.

In an audit observation, COA chided the provincial government for failing to adopt “sound monitoring mechanisms, coordination and evaluation of its solid Waste Management Program” resulting in its failure to “provide a clean and health environment to areas” in the province.

COA also noted that the Biliran government incurred “repetitive payments” to events of the Leagues of the Philippines.

It said the provincial government could have saved R10 million had it used its time deposits of R40 million at the Philippine National Bank (PNB) to finance the projects instead of loaning R30 million from the Land Bank of the Philippines.

The loan was used to finance the rehabilitation and upgrading of the Biliran Sports Complex and other infrastructure projects in preparation for its hosting of the Eastern Visayas Region Athletic meet last February.

The Biliran government “could have used these time deposits to defray expenses for the rehabilitation and upgrading of the said infrastructure projects and there was no need for the Province to obtain additional loan and the huge amount of interest expenses could have been avoided,” COA said.

Auditors learned from the provincial accountant that the time deposit had been in the book of accounts since 2007.

“We recommend that the Provincial Governor, with the assistance of the Provincial Treasurer and the Provincial Accountant, consider using the Time Deposits of the Provincial Government to repay the loans it previously availed to minimize the incurrence of interest expenses and the taxes to be imposed by the bank,” COA said.

Response to the COA report, the provincial board authorized Governor Gerardo Espina Jr. to close the time deposit and settle its loan with Landbank.

COA said Biliran has failed to implement provisions of the Philippine Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000 when it did not adopt sound monitoring mechanisms, coordination and evaluation of its Solid Waste Management Program in 2016.

COA said the provincial government had acquired color-coded trash boxes for its waste segregation program and put up septic tanks for composting hazardous medical waste.

“Some municipalities did not even own a piece of land to serve as the LGUs waste dumpsite and precluded them from developing their own sanitary landfill or construct septic tanks,” said COA.

It also asked Espina to limit “to the most urgent and necessary” the attendance of provincial officials to conferences, assemblies and other events of various Leagues of local governments after the province spent R1.41 million for such activities last year.