BEFORE the Duterte administration assumed power laymen like us did not know that an animal called PS-DBM (Department of Budget and Management Procurement Service) exists in government.
Only veterans in public service had been aware that PS-DBM is there to centralize the procurement of common supplies for all of government. Examples of these common-use items are ballpens, pencils, staplers, paper clips, folders, etc.
Government can stockpile to lessen the cost per item by buying goods in bulk. All government agencies, regardless of specialization, e.g., whether they are engaged in aviation, agriculture, or power, need these common items in the daily course of their operations.
***
The Duterte government did eventually orient the people on the existence of PS-DBM. Unlike previous administrations, it was uniquely in the position to harness panic-driven funds in the context of a world-wide pandemic of catastrophic proportions.
As of June 2021, the DBM was able to release a little less than P700 billion to fund programs aimed at combatting COVID-19. Congressmen and senators spent sleepless nights over the legal support for these gargantuan sums – the Bayanihan One and Two.
***
Surely, we now know what happened to some of these funds earmarked for the lead agency against COVID.
The Department of Health entered into a memorandum of agreement to transfer P42 billion of its COVID response funds to PS-DBM – more than enough money to cover the Philippine archipelago with paper clips?
That money was budgeted to buy face masks, face shields, and other personal protective equipment.
It was doubtful that it was within PS-DBM’s mandate to purchase those items. Hence, the MOA.
***
Lawyers sometimes resort to the rules on statutory construction when unsure about how to interpret a law or regulation.
One of these tools is “noscitur a sociis,” under which the meaning of a problematic word may be derived from its association with other words.
Protective health equipment can hardly be seen to be in the same league as staplers and paper clips that all agencies use in common.
***
But everything was possible under the Duterte government.
While everybody was suffering from a series of hard lockdowns, powerful people were concocting a special brew that made PS-DBM a super-body that could siphon billions in taxpayers’ money and funnel them to favored contractors and suppliers.
Pharmally happened. It was awarded almost P9 billion in contracts for the purchase of medical supplies.
During the blue-ribbon hearings, Senator Richard Gordon flashed a television footage showing Michael Yang introducing Pharmally executives to no less than Rodrigo Duterte himself. The rest, they say, is history.
***
Why did the Department of Education likewise entrust billions of its covid response funding to PS-DBM? Could the imprimatur have been from the Palace?
The laptops were purchased from a joint venture that included a construction company said to be owned by a congressman from Bicol. The congressman has since publicly disavowed the deal, claiming that he has divested from the construction firm.
That response does not address the elephant in the room. How is a construction firm involved in a supply agreement for laptops?
***
Bid fixing is a scheme designed to defeat meaningful competition in government purchases. It frustrates the very purpose behind the enactment of the procurement law. The goal is illegal profit.
Former PS-DBM top honcho Lloyd Christopher Lao, he who planted that agency in our nightmares, is moving to have the Senate lift his travel restrictions due to a contempt citation.
We may just be scratching the surface of this centralized procurement using Bayanihan funds.
Will the current Senate under the leadership of Juan Miguel Zubiri cave in? Are the ghosts of the past administration still haunting us? Or will they be exorcised?/PN
