MANILA – The findings of the auditing team that handled the Department of Budget and Management-Procurement Service (PS-DBM) pertained to inventory management, not the alleged overpricing of medical goods in the fight against Covid-19, according to Commission on Audit (COA) Chairman Michael Aguinaldo.
“The findings of auditing that handles PS-DBM really pertained more to inventory management and not the overpricing,” Aguinaldo said during the Senate inquiry on Tuesday.
During the first few months of the pandemic, the PS-DBM purchased “quite a bit” of face masks ranging in price from PHP13 to PHP27 per piece, Aguinaldo said.
“The problem was hindi po nadispose kasi a lot of these equipment right away so that no’ng dumating po no’ng September (a lot of these equipment were not disposed right away so that when September [2020] came) and the prices went down, the regional offices and the hospitals ng DOH, ayaw nang bumili from PS-DBM kasi mahal (They don’t want to buy anymore from PS-DBM because its expensive already),” he said.
According to him, the PS-DBM was compelled to dispose the Covid-19 supplies “at a discount” due to inventory management issues.
“Now they’re face to the problem with a lot of stock but no one wants to get because its expensive, and so mapipilitan ang PS-DBM (was forced) to dispose of them at a discount. ‘Yun po ‘yung main observation doon (That’s our main observation) that there was a problem in the inventory management,” Aguinaldo said.
Former DBM Undersecretary Lloyd Christopher Lao stated that the PS-DBM granted the contract for the delivery of face masks to EMS Components Assembly.
However, EMS chairman Ferdinand Ferrer stated that after securing a 100-million-piece face mask agreement with the government, only 25 million face masks were purchased at PHP13.50 each.
According to Ferrer, the PS-DBM only paid PHP2.35 for each of the remaining 75 million face masks, resulting in total sales of PHP523 million, far less than the original PHP1.3 billion contract.
