Joselito Malig

Article (news)

RG Cruz

ABS-CBN News

MANILA -- Commission on Audit (COA) Chair Gamaliel Cordoba has described the Bulacan 1st District Engineering Office as the “epicenter” of the flood control scandal.Testifying before the Senate Finance Committee, Cordoba also said they had insufficient manpower for this office alone.“Ang aming napansin on our side would be—kailangan po siguro namin ng tulong ninyo—would be lack of manpower,” Cordoba said. “Like for example, ang pinag-usapan po dito is, ang pinaka-epicenter po nitong nangyari na ito is the 1st District Engineering Office of Bulacan. Ito pong nangyari na ito, ito pong flood control—when we analyzed it—ay 20% of the full amount ay nasa Region 3, and almost 50% of that amount is in Bulacan.”Cordoba said they are now concentrating on Bulacan, but they will soon investigate flood control in the National Capital Region (NCR), where the City of Manila had the highest allocation for flood control.“Right now po we’re concentrating in Bulacan because, as I mentioned earlier, 20% of the full amount for flood control is in Region 3 and 50% is in Bulacan. But ang next po namin that we’ll check, the next highest region po in terms of amount, would be NCR. And the highest for NCR would be the City of Manila po. So using that criteria, ang next po namin—maybe kapag naka-50% na po kami sa Bulacan—we can now go to the City of Manila,” he said.“So when we checked doon po sa ground, napansin po namin we only have two auditors in the First District Engineering Office of Bulacan—yung pong team leader at saka kanyang assistant team leader,” Cordoba added.Cordoba said have shared the results of the fraud audit with the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee.He added that they are also conducting fraud audits on non-flood control items.“Aside po kasi from this flood control, marami din po kaming ongoing na fraud audit. If you would remember, Mr. Chair, marami po kaming natapos—yung pong sa Pharmally, yung pong sa Cagayan Province, yung pong sa Pampanga, sa Mexico. Tapos meron din pong iba pa na ongoing. Meron din po kami sa BARMM, ongoing din po. So we are scheduling it po. Pag naka-more than 50% po kami sa Bulacan, it would show a pattern already. We can now go to the next area po.”Cordoba said they had only 50 auditors assigned to fraud audits.“So we have around 50 auditors po sa Fraud Audit Office. Medyo naka-concentrate po kami ngayon dito sa—sorry po—sa flood control po sa Bulacan. So medyo kulang. But ang ginagawa po namin para mabilis, if you notice, we issue fraud audit reports—around four to five reports per week—for the past month po, simula po August. Four to five per week po ang nai-issue namin. Kaya po nakapag-issue na agad ng preventive suspension po ang Ombudsman based on the eight reports that we submitted to the Office of the Ombudsman.”Cordoba cited a reduction in manpower.“Bumaba po kasi ang aming number of positions dahil po nabawasan po kami ng DBM. Nine hundred sixty-three (963) positions pong naalis. Sa Bulacan po, sa Region 3, 136 positions po ‘yan. So ‘yung pong aming dalawang auditors doon ay nagha-handle ng 11 municipalities, 3 cities, and 8 LTO offices.”Still, Cordoba said notices of disallowance have been issued, and they ordered a fraud audit as well.He said some of their fraud audits have become the basis for the Ombudsman to act, while others have been submitted to the Independent Commission for Infrastructure.Cordoba said fraud audits also look at the liability of resident auditors.“Thank you po, Mr. Chair. Doon po sa ating fraud audit na sinasagawa, part of it po is that the fraud auditors would also look at the negligence or complicity ng atin pong mga resident auditors doon sa baba. And part of that po ay sinasubmit sa amin, and we will go through it po doon sa ating Internal Affairs Office para po mapatawan ng tamang penalty.”Following allegations that Commissioner Mario Lipana may have been involved in the flood control scandal, and that his wife is a government contractor, Cordoba said all COA personnel are mandated to disclose conflicts of interest.COA Commissioner Douglas Michael Malilin, for his part, revealed that the agency will require geotagging for all government projects for better monitoring of progress. A third party will be tasked to perform the geotagging to prevent manipulation.“Ang lumalabas po sa geotagging, ang napapansin ho namin, hindi ho nasusundan. Kung sinusundan ho ang nangyayari, yung mga contractors ho—or whoever is required to geotag—take a picture of the project, pero ho yung geotagging na nilalagay po nila ay hindi tugma kung saan ho talaga yung proyekto.”Malilin said that under their proposed rule, if a project is not geotagged, the contractor will not be paid.He said they are also looking at working closely with other agencies to better monitor contractors.“Nag-uusap na rin po kami ng system integration with the departments on infra. Ito po ang kahulugan nito: yung mga sistema ng DPWH, PCAB, PhilGEPS, SEC, at BIR ho, ipag-iisa natin para magmukhang isang portal. Karamihan ho nangyayari ngayon, katulad ho sa bidding—the bidders are required to submit their bidding documents, and ang pagsisiyasat ho o pagche-check ng mga dokumentong ito ay lahat po manual.”Malilin said they are also looking at conducting wider pre-audits, which were done before 2011, when agencies complained these slowed down their projects.“This was lifted—the pre-audit was there with COA until 2011—but this was lifted considering the clamor of the agencies that a lot of their operations were being hampered or slowed down by the pre-audit. So this was lifted, but there will come a time po we may need to balance the requirement of a pre-audit against going full post-audit po.”However, Malilin explained that this will cost an additional ₱2.7 billion.“Pinag-aaralan ho namin. We will need practically ₱2.7 billion annually just to do pre-audit of DPWH alone. Wala ho tayong pinag-uusapang iba pa hong ahensya. But if we could do the integration of systems, ang magiging focus ho natin is data analytics—then we can really impose the geotagging. We could trim down the requirements for the pre-audit po.”Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, however, said a pre-audit has both pros and cons.“Pros and cons ang pre-audit, diba? Ang pre-audit, una, sigurado tayo—at least makikita nila yung project at mababayaran lang kung nandiyan yung project. Ang downside niyan, mabagal—may delay—so baka madelay naman yung payment at wala nang makikipagnegosyo sa gobyerno. So may pros and cons ‘yan na kailangan pag-aralan,” Gatchalian said. “Itong pre-audit, you will require ₱2.7 billion in addition?”“Yes po. That is only for DPWH po,” Malilin said.Malilin explained that pre-audit and geotagging should be done together for best results.Cordoba said they will submit their draft rule to the Senate for review and suggestions. He also bared that they will implement a reshuffle of auditors to prevent resident auditors from becoming too familiar, and that the central office would conduct surprise visits.Cordoba added that they are also looking at increasing disciplinary penalties for errant personnel.“And I think, ano po, maybe we can increase the penalties dahil matagal na po itong hindi napapalitan, matagal na po itong hindi naa-amend. And because of the increase in the number and amount of transactions, I think it’s about time po na yung penalties po natin ay taasan din po.”

Commission on Audit (COA) Chair Gamaliel Cordoba has described the Bulacan 1st District Engineering Office as the “epicenter” of the flood control scandal.

Commission on Audit (COA) Chair Gamaliel Cordoba has described the Bulacan 1st District Engineering Office as the “epicenter” of the flood control scandal.

COA chair: Bulacan is 'epicenter' of flood control scandal

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COA chair: Bulacan is 'epicenter' of flood control scandal

RG Cruz,

ABS-CBN News

Published October 13, 2025 05:52 PM PHT

Read More:

COA

Commission on Audit

Bulacan

flood control projects

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