How cheap can cars get nowadays? Well, for the Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC), it can go for as low as P1 apiece.
And it’s not typographical error. In a 2011 audit, the Commission on Audit (CoA) found that a fleet of about 51 vehicles only had a total value of P50 in DOTC records.
State auditors reported June 5 that the 50 cars were actually listed with a book value of only P1 per unit while the other one had no assigned value.
The vehicles in question had been listed in the statement of subsidiary ledger balance from the account of the DOTC’s Office of the Secretary (OSEC).
CoA explained the excessive undervaluation is not in consonance with accepted principles that a government agency’s assets shall be carried in the books at cost less depreciation.
It added that the vehicles—which included five units of Hyundai Starex vans—were “loaned” to Malacañang, specifically to the Office of the President (OP).
“In the absence of physical inventory taking, the Audit Team, as an alternative audit procedure, sent a confirmation letter to the Auditor of the OP to validate above listed vehicles,” the report stated.
“Result of confirmation revealed that only one unit with Plate No. SFT-907/WPE-944 costing P830,000 was received by that office (OP),” it added.
In a letter dated July 19, Malacañang informed DOTC that their office is ready to return the Hyundai Starex along with two other vehicles not mentioned in the list.
Malacañang Motor Pool director Edwin Sicat promised to return a Nissan Patrol with a private Plate No. UCV (numbers missing) and a Nissan Pickup with Plate No. SEA 685.
The other four Starex vans remain unaccounted for as of the submission of the audit report last month, CoA said.
But it noted that all were listed under DOTC’s Fund 102 at P1 each with the notation “existence not established as of this date.”
This prompted the commission to ask DOTC, now headed by Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya, to exert efforts to locate documents on the procurement of vehicles in question.
CoA also wants Abaya to determine and reflect in official books their real value including acquisition cost as well as the computed depreciation over the years.
CoA also tasked the Land Transportation Office to trace the specific persons accountable for each vehicle and to require them to be “answerable for the monetary value of the unaccounted properties.”
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