Rama to use P5 million unspent aid for brgys to buy fuel for city vehicles

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama found P5 million unused funds that can be used to augment the city’s budget for fuel.

General Service Office (GSO) head Rolando Ardoza said the money was originally intended as aid to the barangays but was not used since January prompting Rama to realign the amount for fuel.

Ardoza, who also heads the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) announced yesterday that only Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Incorporated participated in the bidding for the supply of fuel.

He said the supplier offered to supply 16,000 liters of gasoline and only 94 liters of diesel.

“Ato ra nga gibana-bana ang budget mao nga gamay ra ang krudo kay gipalabi nato ang gasoline,” said Ardoza.

Most of the city-owned vehicles are gasoline-fed engines except the garbage trucks and some other vehicles.

Ardoza said the P90 million-worth of fuel that they purchased using the P100 million budget that the City Council approved for this year is only good until this month.

According to Ardoza, only P90 million was actually spent for fuel because the P10 million was spent for lubricants.

The statistics show that aside from the newly-purchased vehicles that were distributed to the barangay captains there are 1,222 assorted vehicles owned by the city and the barangays.

A total of 9,017 liters of unleaded gasoline and 59,997 liters of diesel were consumed by the barangay vehicles from January to June while the city-owned vehicles also consumed 26,284 liters of unleaded gasoline and 100,236 liters of diesel.

Rama earlier reduced the fuel allocation of all vehicles, including his service vehicle and that of the other officials of City Hall, because of lack of budget.

Department heads used to have 300 liters of fuel every month while the city councilors were allocated 500 liters. The mayor and the vice mayor have 750 liters each but all fuel allocations were cut by half. – (FREEMAN)