NAGA CITY- Paciencia Tabinas, city auditor, spoke for Mayor Jesse Robredo on Friday (March 14), saying that the city government had not hidden the 2007 Commission on Audit Report from public.
Tabinas was reacting to the issues raised by Vox Bikol columnist Atty. Che Carpio, regarding the claims to transparency of the Naga City government through the posting of vital information in its website.
“COA reports are very accessible to anyone since it is posted on the website of [COA],” she said.
She also said that the city government already had been complying with the requirements set by the state’s independent auditing agency.
She admitted, however, that some of the COA findings are yet to be taken into account. But she said there are no irregular or anomalous transactions on the part of the city government.
“Most of the COA findings resulted from our inability to submit necessary auditing requirements on time such as inventory reports,” she said, “but it is a result of lack of enough manpower to take care of the scrupulous task of complying with COA requirements on time.”
She admitted further that members of the city government’s bid and awards committee (BAC) had been following the mandated procurement procedures although the BAC would still refer to the old rule form time to time.
“But my office always makes sure that no procurement procedure is violated.”
She said most of the local government units in the country were experiencing the same problem of not being able to comply with the requirements of COA on time.
Robredo said he would answer on Monday contentions mentioned in Atty. Jose Maria Carpio’s opinion column in this newspaper published last week. Referring to the 2007 COA report, Carpio said that the city government has not been transparent by “shutting out vital information” from the public, contrary to its claims.
He said there is no mention of the report in the city’s website except a mention of COA as a government agency.
Carpio also commented on several findings of the latest COA report that says the city government has failed to submit necessary documents for audit, has unaccounted funds, has not been sparing in allocating public funds, and has committed violations of procurement law.
His recent column has revealed huge unliquidated cash advances made by the city government which hereby indicated “persistent violations and sheer inability to enforce accountability” on the part of Mayor Robredo’s administration.