ICI asks DPWH to reduce gov’t engineers’ control over biddings
The Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI) wants the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to set limits to the control of district and regional engineers over the bidding for public infrastructure projects to curb corruption by lowering the ceiling of contract amounts they can approve.
In a letter to Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon, ICI Chair Andres Reyes asked that the DPWH immediately reduce the threshold of the contract amounts for procurement of civil works that regional engineering offices can approve to P200 million from P400 million.
For district engineering offices, the ICI suggested that they be allowed to green-light only up to P75 million from P150 million in their bidding plans.
“We urge that this recommendation of this commission be immediately implemented,” the fact-finding body told Dizon.
According to ICI Executive Director Brian Hosaka, the recommendation aims to curb systemic corruption in the bidding processes of the DPWH.
Threshold from Bonoan time
“The suggestion of the ICI is to halve (the LOAs) so that the procurement for civil works will be controlled,” Hosaka told reporters on Thursday.
The flood control scandal revealed that DPWH engineers declared that projects were completed when in fact these were nonexistent or substandard.
The current threshold for the LOAs was implemented during the time of Dizon’s predecessor, Manuel Bonoan, through DPWH Department Order No. 195 in 2022. This order was affirmed in succeeding DOs in 2022 and 2023.
Bonoan said then that the levels of authority he set would “ensure the highest efficiency in the implementation of infrastructure projects.”
The order allowed Bonoan to overrule the authority he had delegated to his subordinates, such as the district and regional engineer.
Such authorities may be modified, expanded, or withdrawn by the public works secretary at any time “as public interest so demands,” according to DO No. 195.
Among the “civil works” items that district and regional engineers could authorize were the procurement project management plan, approved budget contract and notice of award.
Newly installed special adviser to the ICI, Rodolfo Azurin, Jr., said that the site inspections of flagged infrastructure projects may be resumed soon.
Azurin, however, said that he has yet to identify the specific projects he intended to prioritize and would await recommendations from Dizon.
“We will definitely investigate each and every one [alleged to be involved in anomaly],” he said when asked whether there would be “sacred areas” he would protect from the probe.
Aside from Azurin, Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) Chair Michael Aguinaldo also met with ICI officials on Thursday to discuss the mandate of the government’s antitrust body, which has begun its own investigation of alleged bid rigging and manipulation of public works projects.
The DPWH last week asked the PCC to look into cases of possible procurement manipulation involving St. Timothy Construction Corp., Wawao Builders, IM Construction Corp., SYMS Construction Trading, and officials and employees of the DPWH in Bulacan, as well as Sunwest Inc., and officials and employees of its regional office in Mimaropa.
