CITY OF SAN FERNANDO– “Due to some reportorial clarifications by the national office which were not immediately communicated to us,” was the reason cited by the Department of Finance (DOF) after it failed to record the 2011 Statement of Receipts and Expenditure (SRE) of this capital city on its website.
The missing or non-submission of the SRE sparked a controversy after it was featured in news reports that it was meant to cover up for this city’s lackluster performance during the administration of then mayor and now Rep. Oscar S. Rodriguez (3rd District, Pampanga) who gained a reputation as a champion of good governance and now chairs the Committee of Good Governance and Public Accountability in the House of Representatives.
The DOF had initially said that: “it appears that there is a deliberate neglect in complying with the directives of Department Order No. 8 -2011, thus undermining the accuracy of the aggregate LGU report of the BLGF.”
The DOF gave the City of San Fernando a score of “Average” in 2010, “Poor” in 2011, and “Needs Improvement” in 2012. But during a briefing of the members of the Capampangan In Media, Inc. (CAMI) at the media forum “Batirulan at Café Juan” at the Holy Angel University in Angeles City last Friday, Rodriguez, also a stalwart of the Liberal Party, said he was surprised to find out the non-submission of the 2011 SRE and sought a clarification from the DOF.
Rodriguez explained that there was actual transmittal of the documents from the City Treasurer’s Office which handles the transmittal online but glitches in the system rejected them from being received by the DOF central office.
The person in charge of the SRE at the BLGFDOF identified as Rebecca “Becky” Fernandez even had email conversations with the City Treasurer Mary Ann P. Bautista, Rodriguez said. A photocopy of the actual uploading of the 2011 SRE on March 16, 2012 was shown and was captioned: “…the contents of the file cannot be viewed and just keeps on loading.”
Bautista said “a final conversation with Fernandez was made to clarify the data reconciliation they (DOF) need.”
She explained that “after encoding the right data, the problem was found in the system and not within our (Treasurer’s Office) control, we opted to upload another sequel report since we will just be uploading the same sequel which we have given before.” It was dated June 20, 2013.
That is why, Bautista said, they had the report approved “since for us the report is already correct.” The fiscal performances were posted on the DOF website dubbed “Iskor ng ‘yong Bayan,” which, the DOF said, is aimed at promoting governance at all levels by rating the fiscal performances of all Local Government Units (LGUs) through the LGU fiscal sustainability scorecard.
