DepEd washes hands on feeding program bribe scam

Acting Education Secretary Fe Hidalgo on Thursday claimed innocence in an alleged P3-million bribery plot involving the awarding of a P49-million contract for the department's supplemental feeding program. Hidalgo said she knew nothing about the alleged bribery and immediately created a team to investigate the allegations that ranking education officials received dirty money to favor a private contractor. "Hindi kami involved sa bidding and procurement. Pero ang bribery, we really have to look into this," she said in an interview over GMA 7's DZBB. She said the complainant in the bribery case filed at the Office of the Ombudsman should "prove that we received" the alleged P3 million grease money. Parañaque trader Evangeline Benitez on Wednesday filed bribery charges against Hidalgo and five other ranking officials of the Department of Education (DepED) for supposedly receiving P3.2 million from Eric Santos, a sales manager of Jeverps Manufacturing Corp. Charged along with Hidalgo were undersecretary for regional operations Ramon Bacani; Camilo Miguel Montesa, assistant secretary for legal affairs; Antonio Inocentes, presidential assistant for education; Jesus Galvan, assistant secretary for budget and financial affairs; and Thelma Santos, health and nutrition center director. Benitez alleged that the officials accepted the P3.2 million "bribe" in exchange for delaying the scheduled May 4 bidding and ensuring that Santos' firm wins the bidding for the P49 million supplemental feeding program. The DepEd's Health and Nutrition Center will launch the "Supply and Delivery of Fortified Instant Noodles, Biscuits and Powdered Full Cream Choco-Milk" project in the coming 2006-2007 school year. Members of the DepEd National Employees Union (DNEU) claimed newly-appointed Undersecretary Vilma Labrador could have been behind the P3-million scam. DNEU president Domingo Alidon said it was surprising that Labrador was not among the respondents in the Ombudsman case pointing out that as undersecretary for finance, "she would be a member of the bidding committee." "Ang sinasabi namin, ang tingin namin si Labrador na talaga, wala ng iba dahil sa complaint, ang ni-recommend for indiction iyong ibang officials but the name of Labrador was not mentioned. Talagang halata na pakana ito ni Labrador at malamang pakana din ito ng Malacañang," Alidon told DZBB. He did not elaborate but said Labrador's appointment to the post of undersecretary for finance was "questionable." "May mga sinusunod kasi diyan na requirements eh," he said, insisting that "there are other officials deserving the post." Hidalgo said results of the department's investigation into the controversy would be released in one week's time.-GMANews.TV