The Department of Education (DepEd) failed to meet its target to construct 6,379 classrooms, with only 192 completed as of the end of 2023, the Commission on Audit reported.
The CoA report showed that the DepEd fell short in building the classrooms due to “realignments because of modifications in the projects’ design.”
According to the auditing body, there are still 4,391 classrooms that are under construction, while 550 are yet to undergo various stages of procurement.
As for the rehabilitation of classrooms, state auditors reported that the DepEd was only able to repair 208 classrooms out of its initial objective of 7,550.
“2,135 are undergoing repair, while a very significant target of 5,207 are still to be procured,” CoA said.
Audit findings further revealed that the DepEd also did not deliver 580,394 school seats by the year-end of 2023.
Based on the DepEd’s Annual Procurement Plan, the school furniture are expected to be delivered to the end-users in May to June last year.
“However, the contracts were only completed in December 2023, and the delivery are only expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2024,” state auditors said.
DepEd, however, blamed the delay in the procurement process of school furniture for “revisions and approval of the technical specifications.”
For the repair and rehabilitation of classrooms, DepEd said it was ready to conduct early procurement activities for the program and the preliminary activities had already been completed.
“However, when this was transferred to DPWH (Department of Public Works and Highways) for implementation per GAA (General Appropriations Act) FY 2023, the DPWH had to do their own revalidation and programming of the works. Thus, said transfer caused a delay in the implementation,” DepEd told CoA.
The construction and repair of classrooms, and the delivery of school furniture under the Basic Education Facilities has a total allotment of P816,716,848.51.
This was covered by Vice President Sara Duterte during her tenure as DepEd secretary. Duterete headed the DepEd for nearly two years until her abrupt resignation on 19 June.
She was later replaced by seasoned lawmaker Juan Edgardo "Sonny" Angara, who officially took over the post on 20 July.