DFA still owes Belgian-French firm P250M for E-passport system

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) still owes French-Belgian firm Oberthur Technologies P250 million for the implementation of the country's Electronic Passport (E-Passport) system. In an interview with reporters on Thursday, DFA undersecretary for finance and administration Rafael Seguis acknowledged that the DFA has yet to pay the remaining P250 million of the P900 million project won by Oberthur Technologies for the E-Passport project that began in August 2009. Oberthur Technologies won the E-passport project in a public bidding in July 2008 after it offered the lowest bid of P900million. Seguis explained that explained that Oberthur has yet to fulfill certain commitments based on the Terms of Reference (TOR) signed between DFA and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and Oberthur Technologies. "These include training of personnel who will implement the E-passport project and some auditing requirements that are now under evaluation," said Seguis. Although Oberthur was supposed to train DFA personnel for the E-passport implementation, "it's still the DFA which is conducting the training and not the company (Oberthur)," Seguis said. "We will pay them of course, probably by end of the year until they fulfill all these obligations," he added. Cause of delay DFA sources said the delay in payment to Oberthur Technologies is reportedly causing the delay in the issuance of the E-Passports. The sources said Oberthur Technologies did not deliver the additional machines needed to cope with the increasing number of passport applicants. Online application daily has reached 6,900 to more than 7,000 but the DFA said only 4,500 to 5,000 apply individually. - VVP, GMA News