THE government spent P10.339 billion for the Free Wi-Fi for All Program of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) but got too little return for its money, with only 2,890 sites still operational as of April 13, 2022 out of 34,442 that the agency was supposed to put up.
From an initial funding of only P172.56 million in 2015, the DICT received over P10 billion more between 2016 to 2021, the Commission on Audit said.
It noted, however, that despite ample funding, at no time did the agency hit its target number of Wi-Fi sites in those six years.
Records showed the project had P1.325 billion in 2016, P3.317 billion in 2017, P1.66 billion in 2018, P1.445 billion in 2019, P1.371 billion in 2020, and P1.049 billion in 2021.
However, performance tabulation showed the DICT only put up 233 out of 1,313 target sites in 2016 (17.75 percent); 805 of 5,746 in 2017 (14.01 percent); 1,125 of 5,308 in 2018 (21.19 percent); 1,088 of 5,302 in 2019 (20.52 percent); 4,305 of 11,392 in 2020 (37.79 percent); and 4,062 of 5,381 in 2021 (75.49 percent) or a total accomplishment of only 11,618 out of the projected 34,442 Wi-Fi sites.
Verification by the audit team identified only 9,248 actually existed, of which 1,872 have been deactivated as of March 3, 2022, while 2,664 were listed as “under maintenance” leaving only 4,712 sies still working.
A second inspection on April 13, 2022 showed only 6,658 sites are still up but only 2,890 are still working as 3,768 were reported as under maintenance.
On paper, the project was supposed to provide free internet access to the public at national and local government offices; public schools, state universities, colleges, and technical education institutions; government hospitals and health centers; public parks, libraries and barangay reading centers; public airports and seaports, and public transport terminals.
In reality, the DICT admitted the targets proved unrealistic after encountering procurement delays, difficulty in securing permits and authorizations, and network architecture issues.
The audit team was unsympathetic however, noting that the obstacles cited should have been factored in during the planning stages.
“On account of that the said challenges were incurred during the early stages of the implementation, the three-year experience should have taught the Department the necessary measures to be undertaken to meet the set targets,” the COA pointed out.
With the rapid decline of working sites and lack of plans regarding recovery and expansion, the audit team said the DICT failed to comply with the requirement of RA No. 10929 or the Free Internet Access in Public Act.
“From the significant reduction of sites attributed to termination of service contracts and defects in the installed sites… it can be deduced that the Department lacks the sustainability measures to ensure the continuous operability of the already installed sites,” the COA added.
Based on the audit team’s recommendations, the DICT agreed to create plans to step up operationalization of the free Wi-Fi sites and prevent further decrease in number of the existing ones.
