Wednesday, August 22, 2007 NBI requests report on ‘ghost purchases’
THE National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) wants to get copies of the audit reports detailing the alleged ghost purchases of medicines using Cebu City Rep. Antonio Cuenco’s pork barrel funds.
Lawyer Medardo de Lemos, NBI 7 regional chief, has sent the Commission on Audit (COA) a formal letter requesting for copies of two specific documents.
He asked for a copy of the report prepared by the resident COA auditor assigned to the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center (VSMMC) and a consolidated version of the same report filed with the COA central office.
Subpoenas
The NBI will also issue subpoenas to VSMMC doctors whose signatures were allegedly falsified to facilitate the supposed ghost purchases.
The COA reports detail the alleged siphoning off of P2,986,037.20 from the Tonny N’ Tommy (TNT) free medicines program implemented by VSMMC with funds from Cuenco’s Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).
The project ran for three years before it was formally terminated in 2005.
The total amount of government allocation to the project reached some P30 million.
Based on the report, money was siphoned from the program through a scheme called ghost purchases, where documents were allegedly forged to make the purchases appear legitimate and to show that the items bought were given to the intended beneficiaries.
Sales invoices were then used to claim payments from the depository of the program’s PDAF allocation.
The report also detailed how audit and procurement rules were violated in the selection of suppliers for the medicines.
Initial information showed that the drugs used in the program were obtained from Dell Pharmacy, which is reportedly owned by a certain Wendell Villacin.
The same Villacin was identified in an Aug. 2005 affidavit signed by COA witness James Yrastorza as the one who forged medical prescriptions for non-existent persons.
The witness alleged that through referral slips signed by James Cuenco, the legislator’s son, and sales invoices from his own pharmacy, Villacin made fabricated claims that were charged against Cuenco’s PDAF for the program.
Fictitious patients
“One hundred six fictitious patients were given prescriptions of anti-rabies vaccines totaling P2,986, 037.20 by forging the physician’s signatures as confirmed by the concerned doctors,” a portion of the COA report read.
The agency’s resident auditor at VSMMC prepared the report.
The doctors whose signatures were forged in the prescriptions allegedly prepared by Villacin include Doctors Jayson Sangkula, Carlito Astillero, Arnold Laurito, Samuel Anthony Yadao, Benjamin Auguis, Jose Hofilena, Ma. Lizette Portus and Alice Pepito. (KNR)
