By Estrella Torres
The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said lack of concrete planning has been causing failed biddings, and delaying the award of projects in key agencies and departments.
This was part of Budget Secretary Florencio B. Abad’s presentation on the department’s assessment of the P303-billion underspending in 2014, before the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Public Expenditures. He said problems were mainly caused by poor planning in government agencies and departments.
Public biddings at the agency and department levels, he added, have failed or suffered delays due to specific problems on identifying technical specifications/terms of reference. These include problems of government agencies to understand highly complex technical specifications or specialized goods when making procurement.
Abad also said agencies and departments usually fail to submit purchase requisition that caused failure in public biddings and eventually procurement.
The assessment of the DBM was based on the Agency Procurement Compliance and Performance Indicators, a method to assess the performance of a government agency’s procurement activities. The assessment aims to compare the agency’s procurement system with that of the national public procurement and international best practices and standards using baseline standards and indicators.
Abad also said poor cost estimates of projects put out for bidding by departments and agencies have resulted in failure and delays in public biddings.
Meanwhile, the low number of bidders for government projects also contributed to the problems that cause the delay and failure of bidding process.
At the same time, Abad admitted that delays in the release of DBM’s Special Allotment Release Order also led to the bidding woes.
“The lack of appropriate personnel to handle public bidding, and the agencies’ varying interpretation of rules, have caused delays and failures in public bidding,” Abad said.
The budget chief said, of the P2.284.3-trillion national budget for 2014, the government’s actual spending only reached P1.9 81.6 trillion, leaving a P303-billion underspent budget.
Meanwhile, the DBM has released P30.9 billion to allow key agencies to create new positions in their respective Bids and Awards Committees (BACs) and help the accelerate spending, particularly in infrastructure projects.
Abad said among the measures to address underspending is to assign full-time support staff in key line agencies to ensure there are enough personnel and resources to coordinate with the DBM on organization adjustments.
Among these key line agencies that need to increase disbursements include the Department of Transportation and Communications, Department of Education, Department of Public Works and Highway, Department of Health and the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
Abad said in a recent hearing of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Public Expenditures that so far, these line agencies have complied with the measures by creating 90 full-time positions for their BACs. He said these key spending agencies should increase the number of their BACs to handle their procurement procedures.
He said the line agencies have also been tasked to disaggregate project listings. They were also directed to submit to the DBM their implementation plans for the programs and projects in 2015.
The DBM has so far released P30.9 billion worth of lump-sum appropriations for these line agencies besides their respective allocation in the national budget.