If spending too much is a problem for most government agencies, the Sandiganbayan has it the other way around and government auditors are unhappy that the court has barely touched its annual budget in the last three years.
“Out of the authorized average annual budget of P1.38 billion allotted for Personnel Services (PS), Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) and Capital Outlay (CO) received for CYs 2019, 2020 and 2021, only an average of P42.264 million or 6.75 percent was utilized or spent annually by the agency from its total allotments for MOOE and CO,” the Commission on Audit revealed in its 2021 report.
The audit report released last June 30 showed the special anti-graft court, which decides corruption and ill-gotten wealth cases against high-ranking public officials, received P4.14 billion in total budget — P1.496 billion in 2019, P1.366 billion in 2020, and P1.279 billion in 2021.
But out of the combined CO and MOOE purse of P810.609 million in 2019, the Sandiganbayan only spent P51.4 million for a utilization rate of just 6.34 percent.
In 2020, allocations for MOOE and CO reached P571.543 million but expenditures dropped even more at P36.138 million or 6.32 percent of the available funds.
In 2021, with allocations of P517.698 million, combined spending for MOOE and CO only inched up to P39.254 million equivalent to just 7.58 percent.
With an average of 93.25 percent of budgetary allocations untouched in the last three years, the COA warned that the Sandiganbayan has failed to upgrade its equipment and implement programs to improve its performance.
The planned procurement of information and communications technology (ICT) equipment suffered the most with zero disbursements in 2019 and 2021 and only P19,950 or 0.05 percent in 2020.
“The bulk of uncompleted utilization of its funds focused on the procurement of ICT Equipment, that should have brought enhancement to productivity and outputs of employees, better services to clients and attainment of its mandate,” auditors noted.
Over the same period, the court spent less than P1 million or barely one percent on repairs and maintenance of its building and facilities despite having been given P83.4 million in funding for the purpose.
While the audit team noted that the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic affected government functions and transactions, the Sandiganbayan’s records showed it had already incurred “below par utilization of its funds” even before the global health crisis.
The Sandiganbayan admitted the audit observations and assured the COA that it is taking steps to maximize available funding “without sacrificing prudence in government spending.”
It informed the audit team that it is already conducting an evaluation of practices and procedures to speed up implementation of programs, projects, and activities (PPAs) to address the accumulation of unutilized budget.
