In Lapu-Lapu City: 400 plantilla posts unfilled

CEBU, Philippines — The Commission on Audit (COA)-7 has called out the Lapu-Lapu City officials for reportedly not filling the 400 vacant positions but had appropriated more than P135 million for their salaries and wages.

Instead, casual and job order personnel were hired to perform the functions of those vacant regular plantilla positions, which is contrary to Section 455(b)(1)(v) of RA No. 7160 or the Local Government Code of 1991, the COA-7 indicated in its 2022 Annual Audit Report.

The audit team observed that for Fiscal Year 2022, the Plantilla of Personnel Schedule showed that 400 positions were open with an appropriation of P135,421,108 for salaries and wages.

These positions consist of supervisory and support staff levels.

Of the 400 vacant positions, 12 are department heads and assistant department heads.

These positions in LGUs are vital in the discharge of the respective mandate of the offices concerned.

The city also hired 838 casual and 3,244 job order personnel with an appropriation amounting to P182,571,290 and P197,546,248, respectively.

These casual and job order workers are assigned to the different departments to augment their workforce, which in some cases might be tasked to perform the duties and responsibilities of these vacant plantilla positions.

“The non-filling up of vacant plantilla positions is contrary to Section 455(b)(1)(v) of RA No. 7160 which may result in the inefficient management, unsound decision making and immobilization of plan of actions vital to the agency. Likewise, it resulted in the inefficient use of available appropriations for salaries and wages and incurrence of additional or unnecessary expenses charged under Other Maintenance and Operating Expense account in the MOOE,” the audit team said.

The COA Team has recommended that the local government unit prioritize and consider filling-up the vacant positions by hiring new employees and expedite promotion of deserving employees to enhance its services to attain full implementation of programs, plans and activities of the local government unit for the optimal benefit of the constituents as well as to provide equal opportunities to the community.

In its reply, the city government said it is currently reviewing the existing plantilla of positions, organizational structures for rightsizing and evaluate these plantilla of positions it these are still necessary and to abolish those plantilla positions that are deemed inconsistent with CSC and DBM guidelines.

Mactan Shrine

Aside from the unfilled plantilla, the same audit team also observed that the detailed engineering activities were carried out insufficiently for the improvement/redevelopment of the Liberty Mactan Shrine which costs P21.008 million resulting in the inability of COA Technical Services to proceed with the technical evaluation.

The team said the detailed engineering activities of the project were carried out insufficiently, thus, creating doubt on how the agency was able to compute the quantities considering that details in the original plans are incomplete.

The team thus recommended for the city government to provide clarification on the observations so that the COA Regional Technical Services Office can proceed with their technical evaluation.

The Audit Team issued Notice of Suspension No. 2023-001 (2021), on January 19, 2023 for this transaction.

In its reply, the Lapu-Lapu City Government said that the preparation of plans and the program of works and estimates was very tight due to the fact that the project should be finished urgently, since the area will be used as one of the sites for the celebration of the 500 Years of Christianity.

Although there were items not specifically shown in the plans, the city had conducted the pre-bidding conference with the prospective bidder discussing the specific details of the plan and made site visit.

The city government added that the improvement of the shrine was closely coordinated with the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) since they were part of preparation of this celebration.

The NHCP reportedly suggested some changes in the scope of works, hence, variation orders were introduced and undertaken.

During the actual implementation, close coordination with the contractor was done so that all the concerns regarding the plans shall be addressed, the city government added. –/GAN (FREEMAN)