SERIOUS efforts to curb graft and corruption by reducing red tape in every city and municipality are being undertaken by the Anti-Red Tape Authority (ARTA) created under the Republic Act No. 11032. These efforts, however, will come to naught without an equally serious commitment on the part of citizens to understand and ensure that the new law is complied with by their city or municipality. Corrupt officials are usually averse to automation. Apathy or tolerance on the part of citizens make them privy to the corruption. Local business chambers which do not demand the compliance of their respective local government units to the law lose their moral ascendancy to even claim that they are working for a progressive local economy.
This week and next week will be devoted to sharing the salient features of RA 11032, a new law which promotes ease of doing business and efficient government service and amends Republic Act No. 9485 or the Anti-Red Tape Act of 2007. The so-called ease of doing business (EODB) law, it mandates the streamlining and improving the current systems and procedure of government services and aims to reduce processing time, cut bureaucratic red tape and eliminate corrupt practices.
The law applies to all government offices and agencies including local Government units (LGUs), government-owned and controlled corporations and other government instrumentalities, whether located in the Philippines or abroad that provide services covering business and non-business related transactions.
The main requirement of the law is for government entities to craft and disseminate a Citizen’s Charter that will design specific rules and will make the source office responsible and liable for non-compliance. It is therefore imperative especially for LGUs to create or revised their Citizen’s Charters by December last year based on the deadline set by RA 11032.
Government transactions must adopt “zero contact” policy and must have corresponding maximum period for processing of permits, licenses and certificates. Except during the preliminary assessment, no government office or employee shall have any contact, in any manner, unless strictly necessary with any requesting party concerning an application or request.
To effectively assist the citizens, clients and customers, the government entities in its Citizens Charter, administrative policies and local legislations, must set up the most current and updated service standards in the form of information billboards that detail comprehensive form checklist of requirements for each type of application or request, procedure to obtain a particular service, persons responsible for each step, maximum time to conclude the process, document/s to be presented by the applicant or requesting party, amount of fees and procedure for filing complaints.
The head of the office or agency shall be primarily responsible for the implementation of this Act and shall be held accountable to the public in rendering fast, efficient, convenient, and reliable service.
For all lawful and official transactions with government, every customer or client must ensure that government agencies accept applications, requests, and documents, perform preliminary assessment, assign a unique identification number to an application request and issue an acknowledgement receipt. The acknowledgement receipt shall contain seal of agency, name of the responsible officer or employee, unit and designation, and the date and time of receipt.
Under RA 11032 and which should be defined in the local government unit’s citizen’s charter, the maximum prescribe time for simple transaction is 3 working days.
For complex transactions, the maximum period is 7 working days and highly technical transaction, 20 working days. The period may be extended only once for the same number of days. For transactions which requires Sanggunian approval, the maximum is 45 working days. The period can be extended for another 20 working days.
The maximum numbers of signatories in any document shall be limited to a maximum of 3 signatures. No application shall be returned to the applicant or requesting party without appropriate action. Any denial of application or request for access to government service shall be fully explained.
When applicable, the government office can develop electronic versions of licenses, clearances, permits, certifications, or authorizations with the same level of authority as that of the signed hard copy, which may be printed by the applicants or requesting parties in the convenience of their offices.
If a government office or agency fails to approve or disapprove an original application or request for within the prescribed processing time, said application or request shall be deemed approved for as long as all required documents have been submitted and all required fees and charges have been paid. If a government office or agency fails to act on an application or request for renewal within the prescribed processing time, said license clearance, permit, certification or authorization shall automatically be extended.