HOUSE of Representatives Deputy Minority Leader Antonio Tinio has asked the Office of the Ombudsman to investigate the alleged irregularities involving 80 contracts amounting to P4.4 billion flood control projects in Davao City’s First District from 2019 to 2022.
Tinio said the complaint-report he submitted to the Ombudsman was based on the House’s independent investigation covering 121 flood control projects along Davao and Matina Rivers.
Among these irregularities were possible duplicate payments or ghost projects amounting to P135 million; double funding of same flood control project as shown in the 2020 General Appropriations Act (GAA) and was awarded to two different contractors; location changes and shortchanging involving eight projects amounting to P425 million; 65 contracts amounting to P3.56 billion lacked specifications; P623 million worth of contracts lack General Appropropriations Act authorization; and 10 unfinished flood control projects worth P713 million.
Tinio also noted that 49 out of the 80 red-flagged contracts were reportedly congressional insertions, all concentrated in Davao City’s First Legislative District.
The representative of Davao City’s First District from 2019 up to present is Paolo ‘Polong’ Duterte, son of the former President and brother of Vice President Sara Duterte.
‘The anger of the Filipino people against corrupt officials is valid. Almost a year has passed since the flood control corruption investigation began, yet no high-ranking official has been held accountable,’ Tinio said.
‘We respectfully urge the Ombudsman to conduct a thorough investigation of these flood control projects, with priority attention to physical verification of incomplete and ‘100 percent’ complete but on-going projects,” he added.
Specifically, Tinio, the nominee of the party-list group ACT Teachers said the Ombudsman’s investigation should determine who initiated, endorsed, approved, implemented, and benefited from these items, and whether procurement and implementation were aboveboard.
‘The Ombudsman must examine the full chain of accountability-from budget itemization and approvals to bidding, implementation, inspection, and payment-because this involves billions in publicfunds and flood control projects that directly impact public safety,’ he stressed.
Meanwhile, in a statement, Polong Duterte lambasted Tinio for being ‘selectively blind’ in seeking accountability for anomalous flood control projects.
‘Why focus solely on Davao while conveniently ignoring the larger controversies hounding the present administration and its allies?’ he added. Duterte pointed out that records of the Department of Public Works and Highways Region XI would show completed and above-standard infrastructure projects in Davao City from 2020 to 2022 amounting to approximately P49.84 billion.
‘These include roads, drainage systems, bridges, and other public works that Dabawenyos continue to benefit from today,’ Duterte said.
He also claimed that Davao City had a zero budget for four years now. ‘ACT Teachers was supposed to fight for educators, classrooms, salaries, and the future of Filipino students. Instead, Tinio has become a full-time anti-Duterte political operator whose press conferences now outnumber his actual initiatives for teachers,’ he added.