P709-M fuel subsidy idle amid crisis — CoA

A Commission on Audit (CoA) report found that P709.88 million allocated for the Department of Transportation’s (DoTr) fuel subsidy program remained undistributed because of deficiencies in beneficiary data required to release payments.

“Fuel subsidy totaling P709,880,800 remained undistributed to the intended beneficiaries due to rejection of transactions by the bank arising from incorrect data required for the release of payments,” the report said.

State auditors said the failure to distribute the funds violated the provisions of a memorandum of agreement (MoA) signed on 28 June 2024.

The said MoA required the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) “to coordinate and facilitate the effective distribution of the fuel subsidy.”

P2.85M must be refunded

CoA further identified P2.85 million in overpayments that have yet to be refunded because of duplicate submissions of Authority to Debit.

“These deficiencies undermine the objective of the Government to provide assistance to qualified beneficiaries as mandated under the General Appropriations Act of 2022, 2023 and 2024,” state auditors said.

Instead of the findings, the auditing agency urged the LTFRB and the DILG to ensure that masterlists were properly verified and to reconcile the “outstanding, rejected and unrefunded” amounts.

The P709.88 million in undistributed funds was just a small portion of the P58.84 billion that remains undisbursed at the transportation agency due to similar issues in the distribution of fuel subsidy.

State auditors also said the agency needs to resolve issues involving P1.06 billion in unliquidated fund transfers caused by “delay in the release of fund transfers and the continued transfer of funds to projects that were not implementation ready.”

CoA said that the development “exposed government resources to risk of prolonged non-utilization.”