Thursday, September 13, 2007
Gadgets ‘complete during turnover of abattoir’
ALL the butchering gadgets of the P50-million slaughterhouse in Barangay Mohon, Talisay City were complete when it was turned over to Mayor Socrates Fernandez in 2004.
A nine-page accomplishment report dated Sept. 21, 2004 of the Office of the City Engineer even bore the signature of Fernandez, acknowledging its contents.
The four other signatories were engineer Antonio V.M. Bernardo, the project contractor, City Engineer Audie Bacasmas, Assistant City Engineer Gamaliel Vicente Jr. and Office of the Building Office head Ariel Araw-araw.
The City-owned abattoir, which has been certified as a double A facility by the National Meat Inspection Commission, became controversial after the Commission on Audit (COA) technical service office noted that that project is only 88.32 percent finished.
The plant’s deficiencies include the steel gate-guard house, perimeter fence, freight and delivery, installation, testing, commissioning and training, COA said.
State auditors also found that some of the abattoir’s equipment such as the hog-line-splitting saw with balancer, meat grinder, mixer, patty former, bowl cutter, stuffer and linker could no longer be found in the facility.
The COA then ordered City Hall to claim the non-existing items and correct the plant’s physical deficiencies such as the steel gate and perimeter fence.
“Otherwise, the overpayment of P5.8 million will be made a personal liability of the approving officials,” COA warned.
With the accomplishment report bearing Fernandez’s signature, the mayor could not simply wash his hands of the
irregularities at the slaughterhouse, said a local legislator, who asked not to be named.
The mayor earlier said his predecessor, former Talisay City mayor-now Rep. Eduardo Gullas (Cebu, 1st district), initiated the slaughterhouse and that he merely inherited it from him.
“But it’s unfair to blame Gullas because he was no longer the mayor when the slaughterhouse fully operated in 2005,” said the legislator.
City Veterinarian Galileo Larawan also confirmed that some of the gadgets of the slaughterhouse were already missing when he assumed administrative work at the abattoir.
He said the brisket saw, a tool for cutting up livestock and bones, was still there when the facility was inaugurated in Nov. 2004 with Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap.
Larawan already resigned as the facility’s manager last Aug. 2, through a formal letter addressed to Fernandez.
But he still acts as the abattoir’s regulatory officer, inspecting livestock before and after butchering. (GC)
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (September 13, 2007 issue)
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