BANGUED, Abra August 12 – The Commission on Audit (COA) disclosed the municipal government of Bangued did not submit any document to liquidate almost 45 percent of the total P5.2 million downloaded by the Cordillera office of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD-CAR) to the local government which was intended for the supplemental feeding program casting doubt whether intended users benefitted from the said program.
In its annual audit report of the funds of the municipality, the COA ruled liquidation reports submitted by the local government were not actually supported with complete documents.
“Under/over allocation was noted in violation of the implementing procedure under the Omnibus Guidelines of the supplementary feeding program for the day care children,” the COA report stated.
AT the same time, the COA recommended to the municipal accountant to match the recording in the books with the occurrence of transactions to clearly present the balances of accounts and the financial statements relative thereto.
After the conduct of an exit conference with concerned local officials, the COA disclosed the Bangued municipal government submitted the necessary liquidation reports amounting to P4.253 million subject for verification.
Earlier, Bangued municipal government received funds amounting to P750,000 and P5.255 million (50 percent first tranche) from DSWD to finance various proposed bottom –up budgeting (BuB) projects and implementation of expanded assistance to individuals in crisis situation, respectively.
The COA uncovered the funds use to finance various proposed bottom-p budgeting (BuB) projects remained intact as of year-end and due to alleged late release, the local government was not able to implement the desired projects before the end of the calendar year.
Meanwhile, the COA noted the issuance of a single check amounting to P5.253 million to a single person named as a certain Marilou Borillo as implementation of expanded assistance to individuals in crisis situation as the same was earmarked for honorarium of barangay health workers.
The CO also noted the grant of cash advance to the cashier Borillo was properly recorded as debit to cash disbursing officer (103) account but another entry was made under the December 2014 general journal to record liquidation amounting to P5.253 million closing the cash disbursing officer 103 account to the due to national government agencies (416 account, however, no journal entry voucher and supporting documents was submitted to support the entry made.
The COA cited verification of bank reconciliation statement as of year-end revealed that check no. 582716 was not yet presented to the bank for encashment, hence, still an outstanding check, therefore, liquidation of the amount should not have been recorded at year-end.
The COA pointed as a result, both cash disbursing officer 103 and due to national government agencies 416 accounts were under stated casting doubts on where the funds were used to its prescribed purpose or that the same have been diverted for other purposes.