COWD management to probe ‘excessive’ meal

The management of the Cagayan de Oro Water District (COWD) is looking into the supposed excessive meals spent by some members of the Board of Directors (BoD) in their out of town travel as there may be misunderstandings on the observations of the Commission on Audit-Northern Mindanao (COA-10).

COWD acting general manager Engineer Bienvenido Batar said the meal expenses of some board members in their official business outside the city may not be used up just by themselves alone.

The 2017 audit report of COA-Northern Mindanao showed that some board members spent single meal amounting from P620.00 to P4,367.45 on certain occasions, which bordered on being 'excessive'.

"Most often when they attend conferences outside CDO it is possible that they will have lunch or dinner meeting with contemporaries and when they invite sila ang mogasto (they shoulder the expenses)," Batar said.

Batar explained that a meal of perhaps '5-6' people, the possible cost of meal would be that expensive.

He said the board member only submits a receipt of their expenses with no other document.

Batar said they will try to come out with a scheme to document the board

member’s engagements including the people they are meeting with over a meal.

He also said each board member has cap when they travel on official business which is subject for reimbursement and the management will look into it.

“Tan-awon namo ang specifics ani nga transaction basin it may be misunderstood kay basin hotel accommodation ni unya naapil na ang meals (we will look into this specific transaction because they may have already included the hotel accommodation on the receipt),”Batar said.

“Naa man cap kada travel pero dili lang kaayo nako madumduman pero akong i-check (There’s a set limit for every travel, I just forgot it but I will check),”he added.