AFTER five years and P66.29 million in expenditures, the Office of Transportation Cooperatives (OTC) has yet to show any measurable accomplishment in implementing the government’s Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program (PUVMP).
In its 2021 report released yesterday, the Commission on Audit said the OTC has failed to come up with measurable target or quantifiable indicators with specific timeframes for its participation in the program.
Launched by the Department of Transportation (DOTr) in 2017, the PUVMP aimed to restructure, modernize, and make public mass transportation environmentally sustainable while providing PUV drivers and operators stable and sufficient income.
The OTC was chosen as one of the implementing partners of the program primarily tasked with advancing the industry consolidation component and in providing a supporting role for the rest of the components of the program.
The latter covers regulatory reform, fleet modernization, financing, pilot implementation, social support mechanism, and communication plan.
State auditors noted that the agency received P248.204 million in total funding from the DOTr-Office of the Secretary.
However, as of yearend 2021, it has only used P66.29 million representing a measly 26.71 percent of the total budget.
Because of low utilization, P121.92 million of the program fund was reverted to the Bureau of Treasury even as another P60 million is awaiting release of a notice of cash allocation (NCA).
The COA said fleet or industry consolidation refers to the job assigned to the OTC to spur action among transport industry players to form transport service cooperatives (TSCs) to facilitate consolidation and collective ownership of PUVs in preparation for fleet modernization.
For 2021 the OTC set aside P44.506 million to cover the operations relative to the scaling up of the self-reliance and competitiveness of transport cooperatives through assistance for accreditation with the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA), capacity building activities, and information and education activities.
The COA however noted that only P14.44 million was spent during the year of which P14.4 million was for salaries and wages of the PUVMP Project Management Office.
“It bears stressing though that there were no measurable targets and/or quantifiable indicators with specific timeframes in carrying out the activities… hence, the reported accomplishments of OTC… could not be assessed effectively and objectively,” the commission said.
