The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said on Monday it is poised to cancel the membership to the government’s procurement system of Wawao Builders, SYMS and other contractors involved in anomalous flood-control projects.This follows the cancellation of the Philippine Government Electronic Procurement System (PhilGEPS) membership of nine companies linked to Sarah Discaya as announced late last week.
Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman, in a statement issued on Monday, said the Procurement Service-Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM) is just awaiting the official blacklisting order from the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to implement the cancellation.“If you remember, the president has ordered the blacklisting of contractors involved in anomalous flood-contol projects. It is stated in our New Government Procurement Act — that the implementing agency is the body that should blacklist these contractors. That is clear, the process is defined. And we, at the PS-DBM, are ready to cancel these other companies in PhilGEPS to prevent them from getting involved in the procurement activities of the government,” Pandandaman said in Filipino.
The DBM said the cancellation of PhilGEPS membership in the event of blacklisting is in accordance with the provisions of the New Government Procurement Act (NGPA) or RA12009.
This consequently removes the companies’ records from the PhilGEPS registry, and therefore totally prohibits them from joining any procurement project of the government, the DBM explained.
The declaration of newly appointed DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon to disqualify the government’s top flood-control contractors stemmed from witnessing the non-existent or poor-quality flood-control projects worth millions of pesos of public funds.
“With the investigation now in full swing, the PS-DBM, led by Executive Director (ED) Genmaries Entredicho-Caong, commits to advancing transparency in search of the truth,” the DBM said in the statement.
“We at the PS-DBM understand our responsibility to assist other agencies of the government in ensuring no corruption should taint our government, especially in the aspect of public procurement,” Entredicho-Caong said, emphasizing that PhilGEPS is the primary source of government procurement information and the main channel in the government’s conduct of all its procurement activities.
