SC declares gov’t deal with Stradcom void, orders refund of RFID fees

THE HIGH COURT ordered the refund of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) fees collected from vehicle owners, as it declared the memorandum of agreement (MoA) between the government and Stradcom Corporation as null and void due to lack of public bidding.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, the SC Public Information Office (PIO) said the Supreme Court, in a decision dated Jan. 31, ordered a refund of the RFID fees collected during the three months’ implementation of the project in late 2009.

“The RFID fees collected during the implementation of the RFID Project prior to the issuance of this Court’s Status Quo Ante Order (SQAO) are likewise ordered refunded to the payors thereof,” the decision reads in part. The SQAO was issued on Jan. 12, 2010.

Owners of public vehicles were required to pay an additional P350 as RFID fee for every registration. The total amount collected was pegged at P29,894,200.

Proposed by Stradcom, the project was aimed at improving the motor vehicle registration system by introducing the automatic identification technology where data is encoded in an RFID tag and can be captured by a reader using radio waves. It was expected to help strengthen the government’s anti- colorum efforts and protect the riding public from devious drivers.

The Department of Transportation and Communication (DoTC) and Land Transportation Office (LTO), and Stradcom had signed the MoA on June 16, 2009, and the project implemented later that same year.

However, the Supreme Court noted the project should have undergone public bidding, as held in Section 5 of the Build- OperateTransfer (BOT) law.

“In this case, it is patently admitted by the [former DoTC/ LTO] that no public bidding was conducted on the RFID project, which was presented by Stradcom as a proposal that would enhance the existing LTO IT project,” the decision read.

“The RFID MoA must, thus, be struck down by this Court for failure to comply with the rules on public bidding. There is no guarantee that RFID fee that will be charged to the public is a fair and reasonable price, as it has not undergone public bidding.”

The high court also noted that it was not guaranteed that the public “will be receiving maximum benefits and quality services, especially from the additional hardware, such as the RFID tags and readers.”

Likewise, the SC noted that under the Implementing Rules and Regulations of the BOT Law, “the RFID Project does not qualify as an allowable contract variation of the [ BuildOwn- Operate] Agreement. It stressed that the RFID MoA is not an allowable contract variation, involving as it does an increase in the agreed fees, tolls, and charges to be exacted upon the public.”

The Court also added that the P350 charge was not part of the original contract.

The 30- page decision was penned by Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes P.A. Sereno. —