Thus, Mayor Edgardo D. Pamintuan labelled the tax watch advertisement released last Wednesday by the Department of Finance listing Angeles City as one of 19 cities and eight provinces that failed to report the required electronic Statement of Receipts and Expenditures (eSRE) for the second quarter of 2015.
In alphabetical order, Angeles City came first in the list under the heading “How much incomes were raised by the cities and provinces during the second quarter this year? How were these funds utilized? You’ll never know unless you demand for reports.”
Mabalacat City is also in the list. Pamintuan said the city complied with the requirement for provincial, municipal, and city treasurers to submit the eSRE for the second quarter no later than July 20, pursuant to DOF Department Order No. 08-2011.
He admitted though that uploading the report was delayed due to “technical glitch” in the internet connection, “constraining the city to submit a hard copy but the DOF rejected it.”
“Ketang June 20 mig-bog down ya ing internet pero July 30 tinggap da ne. O ngeni August na o’t e de pa mo kinorek, o’t inabe da ka tamu pa mu rin (On June 20 the internet bogged down but they received it on July 30. It’s already August and they haven’t corrected it and they included us in the list),” Pamintuan said.
“Ing asabi ku mu keng Department of Finance matamad la (All I can say is the DOF is lazy) or they don’t care.”
According to Pamintuan, the “right thing” for the DOF to have done was update its list of compliant LGUs after receiving the city government’s updated income and expenditures report and “prevented the confusion and errors” in its “shaming list.”
Aside from the two Pampanga cities, the list of non-compliant cities included Cavite, Guihulngan, Ilagan, Imus, Malolos, Marawi, Masbate, Naga in Cebu, Puerto Prinsesa, Roxas, Santa Rosa, Sorsogon, Surigao, Tabuk, Tagbilaran, Talisay in Cebu, and Toledo. Listed as non-compliant provinces are Biliran, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao, Negros Oriental, Sultan Kudarat, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi, and Western Samar.
Second time
The mayor said this was the second time the DOF placed the city in an “embarrassing spot owing to an erroneous report.”
“The first was when the DOF publicized that Angeles City did not increase its real property tax rates in 18 years. This, over a month after the RPT hike,” Pamintuan noted.
In his first term in 1995, Pamintuan said he was the only mayor to fully comply with the provision of RPT reassessment stipulated in the Local Government Code.
“As I still do, in my current term, in compliance with the three-year period required by the law,” he added.
