Thursday, October 02, 2008 BAC held liable in hospital equipment purchase scam By Erwin Cabarles
THE Commission on Audit (COA) held the Iloilo Provincial Government’s Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) liable for the alleged anomalous purchase of the autoclave sterilizer equipment for the Don Valerio Palmares Memorial Hospital in Passi City.
According to information, the audit team points the fault to the BAC for the alleged scam in the bidding process for the purchase of the P1.3 million hospital equipment.
Reports indicated that the BAC has committed some lapses during the bidding and failed to fully check the background of the two participating bidders, which are CDC Pharmacy and Pacific Trade House, the latter being the winner of the bidding.
It should be known that COA had a strong belief that both bidding joints were in fact owned by only one person identified as a certain Mercedez Sibug, thus making the bidding illegal.
With this, the audit team issued a Notice of Suspension of Transaction to the BAC where the latter is given 90 days to comply with the said order. Should the BAC fail to comply with it after the given time frame, COA will issue a Notice of Disallowance to the BAC. If the said notice is not complied with, the BAC will be the one to answer for the anomalies and discrepancies and will be forced to refund the money spent for the purchase of the hospital equipment.
Governor Niel Tupas Sr. meantime has stepped in the issue, directing the Provincial Legal Office to take up the matter to find out if the BAC has really committed an error.
