Lawmaker flags DICT's P3-billion fund transfer to MMDA

Northern Samar Representative Paul Daza on Wednesday questioned the transfer of at least P3 billion budget of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) for the Wi-Fi for all program to the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA), calling it "highly suspicious."

Daza, in a privileged speech, said a significant portion of the P12-billion budget that Congress allotted to the DICT for the Free Wi-Fi for All Program were "somehow transferred to the MMDA through Memorandums of Agreement."

“We were informed recently that about three to four billion pesos of the budget allocation was ‘distributed’ to the MMDA and several LGUs,” he said.

“I believe that such inter-agency transfers, without clear guidance from Congress — which is mandated to enact the General Appropriations Act — is highly suspicious, if not illegal,” he added.

Daza did not specify if the entire amount involved in the fund transfer came from the 2022 budget.

Aside from the fund transfer, Daza also asked how MMDA is spending the P1.1 billion fund it received from DICT for the NCR Fiber Optic Backbone Development Project. He said only one entity qualified in the bidding process.

“Do you know how many qualified bidders participated in this high-value project? One. Just one. Of course, this lone bidder won. While the bidding documents are available online, the MMDA website does not provide any details about the supposed awarding,” Daza pointed out.

“What was the criteria and scoring to determine who was qualified and unqualified for this bidding? Were there even other bidders who were screened?” he said.

He also said that the MMDA’s Landscape Treatment Project for Pocket Parks costing P33.2 million as well as expenditure on two laptops worth P181,000; and a tablet worth P121,000 appeared to be overpriced.

“Let’s just hope that our assumption of good faith holds true, otherwise, MMDA may just stand for ‘Money Making from DICT Allocations’,” Daza said.

GMA News Online has reached out to MMDA and DICT for comment and will publish their response as soon as it is available.—LDF, GMA Integrated News