THREE STRIKES YOUR OUT

August 20, 2022 Opinion

The Department of Education (DepEd) under the guidance and direct supervision of Vice President Sara Duterte should start streamlining most of its administrative functions to further smoothen its operations and not rely on other agencies to do its job. This is important considering that the DepEd once again hogged the limelight after the Commission on Audit (COA) flagged it for purchasing 2.4 billion worth of expensive but archaic laptops for their
teachers.

It must be noted that the request, order and purchase of equipment such as computers fall under the administrative functions of an agency or office such as DepEd. COA in its report requested an explanation from Dep-Ed on why laptops bought through the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management (PSDBM) cost P58,300 per unit when the approved budget for the contract (ABC) pegged each unit at only P35,046.50 per
unit, thus an excess amount of P23,253.50 per unit.

It was also discovered by COA that the 39,600 laptops bought ran on Intel Celeron processors which are among the cheapest in the computer markets and usually utilized in budget computers. When DepEd explained its exorbitant
purchase of laptops it immediately pointed to the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM) as the “procuring entity” and practically saying that it had no hand in the matter of the
purchase or the cost.

Meanwhile the PSDBM came out with an explanation that it plans to conduct a thorough examination of the cost as well as the technical specifications of the laptops that were bought. Now what exactly is the PSDBM? Well it was created through Letter of Instruction No. 755 in 1978, “with the primary task of implementing the central procurement system for the use of other government agencies.” What this means is that the PS-DBM as a department store that seeks to offer common-use items needed by government agencies which can be bought a low price and without burdening the end-user agencies of looking for third party suppliers themselves.

It also means allowing the PSDBM to act a conduit between the end-user agency and suppliers of equipment and
materials. The operative word or words that define the function of the PS-DBM is procuring quality equipment and materials for end-user agencies at an affordable price that redound to the benefit of the government. What happened in the DepEd laptop acquisition seems to be the reverse. Not only were the laptops acquired at a very high price but they were nearly unserviceable due to their outmoded components.

This is not actually the first time that the PS-DBM has been embroiled in a controversy over its function as a procuring entity. It can be recalled that it was also involved in the overprice purchase of face shields and masks from
Pharmally for the Department of Health (DOH) as well as the parking of funds by the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP), and now the DepEd laptop purchase brouhaha. Three times that the PS-DBM has become involved
in questionable undertakings worth billions of pesos. In baseball parlance and mechanics if you fail to squarely hit the ball for the third time then your are out.

Perhaps both houses of Congress, and may be even Malacañang should start to seriously consider the suggestion that perhaps the PSDBM has already outlived its usefulness. In fact just recently House Bill No. 3270 was filed in
the Lower House which seeks to abolish the PS-DBM for its involvement in anomalies. Not to be outdone Senator Sherwin Gatchalian also criticized the purchase by the PS-DBM of outdated and overpriced laptops for the DepEd saying that it is a “great disservice to the teachers”. Whatever might be said about the PS-DBM and its functions it is high time to conduct a comprehensive review of its operations and whether there is still need for its existence, and in order to further avoid being involved in other controversies.