Amid the fiasco on flood control projects, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and Blockchain Council of the Philippines (BCP) have inked a partnership to use blockchain technology to ensure transparency and accountability in national infrastructure projects.
In a signing of memorandum of agreement (MOA) on Tuesday, the DPWH and BCP committed to launch Integrity Chain, a blockchain-powered platform which aims to provide a real-time public dashboard that tracks progress on infrastructure projects, such as the bidding, planning, and awarding.
The DPWH also said that this platform also allows the public to scrutinize the projects and report anomalies and tampering of records.
‘As part of the pilot, BCP will provide the DPWH with a one-year complimentary subscription to the Integrity Chain, which includes technical support, training, and cybersecurity measures in full compliance with the Data Privacy Act of 2012,’ the DPWH said in a statement.
DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon also shared that the pilot implementation will begin with the foreign-assisted projects as their funding and documents are already vetted by multilateral and international organizations. He also said that the implementation for locally-funded projects will follow.
‘If we use this, we will be able to catch those who are responsible. It is important to partner with the private sector because they will help us. They will serve as our eyes. Because it is impossible to monitor what’s inside the DPWH, we need to seek help outside the agency,’ Dizon noted.
Dizon also said that he expects ‘greater transparency’ now that the agency has partnered with the private sector for the use of blockchain technology.
‘This is a very important step, the use of blockchain is a very important step to monitor each and every step of the process of each department, from the central office down to the regional and district offices,’ he said in an ambush interview.
With this, Dizon said that tampering of records will become ‘virtually impossible’ as documents and transactions are shared with everyone in the platform.
The Independent Commission for Infrastructure previously denounced reports of ‘widespread destruction and tampering’ of DPWH personnel of documents related to anomalous flood control projects.
ICI Chairperson and retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Andres Reyes Jr warned that ‘any attempt to destroy, falsify, or conceal them is a grave offense that carries both administrative and criminal liability.’
What is blockchain technology?
BCP President Donald Lim described blockchain technology as a ‘consensus mechanism’ which is a decentralized digital ledger that records all transactions to ensure check and balance.
‘Like on a budget, you can’t change the numbers because if anyone steals from it, we will know who is responsible. If someone inserts a budget, we will know who did that. If someone amends, we will be informed. Everyone will see. It’s a recording of a ledger,’ Lim said in a separate interview.
When asked if connivance is possible in manipulating records using the technology, Lim said that it’s difficult to do so. He noted that the Integrity Chain involves private sectors that will monitor the infrastructure projects.
‘It’s difficult to collude because you need to convince all organizations to not approve or approve it. There’s a technical blockchain but there’s also human blockchain that we created today,’ he added.
He said that the Integrity Chain will be funded by a ‘blind trust’ where the organizations will ask funding from different private corporations.
‘To ensure that there will be no undue influence, there will be blind trust. No one will know who’s contributing,’ Lim noted.
Lim also shared that they will set up a technical working group in the coming week, which will be monitored by the DPWH.
During the MOA signing, presidents and leaders of private businesses, academe, civic, professional and faith-based organizations pledged to use their credibility and networks to ensure the success of the Integrity Chain.
‘By making every peso traceable, immutable, and observable, we create a system where accountability is no longer optional but guaranteed. Through this pilot with the DPWH and the legislative momentum in Congress, we aim to demonstrate that when the private sector and government act together, integrity can prevail,’ the organizations’ statement of support read. /cb