Abolition of DBM’s graft-ridden Procurement Service pushed

The Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM) needs to be “abolished” to save on government funds merely funneled to bureaucratic corruption, just like the Department of Education’s purchase of pricey laptops, according to a lawmaker.

“There’s absolutely no need for the Procurement Service, which has become wholly redundant and has merely served as a breeding ground for corruption,” Surigao del Sur Rep. Johnny Pimentel said.

Pimentel, vice chairman of the House of Representatives’ committee on good government and public accountability, filed House Bill 5748 to prevent the repeat of the alleged P2.4-billion overpriced purchase of second-rate laptops for public school teachers.

He said he wants the PS-DBM to be permanently shut down or “abolished,” and proposed that employees that would be affected should be able to “receive separation benefits under the government reorganization law.”

In the bill’s explanatory note, Pimentel pointed out that Republic Act 9184, or the Government Procurement Reform Act of 2003, had rendered the PS-DBM “totally irrelevant and unnecessary.”

“All government agencies, since 2003, have been empowered to establish their own bids and awards committees (BACs) for their respective procurements through competitive bidding,” he said.

“The Procurement Service’s shutdown via an act of Congress would also give more meaning to the mandate of the 1987 Constitution for the state to take effective measures against corruption, and to maintain honesty and integrity in public service,” he added.

Once the bill is enacted into law, all prior years’ and the current year’s advances for the purchase of supplies, materials and equipment not available in the PS-DBM’s inventory would “revert to the National Treasury.”

The PS-DBM was created in 1978 through Letter of Instruction 755, which established an integrated purchasing system for the national government and its instrumentalities.

At the height of the pandemic, the PS-DBM was also embroiled in alleged irregularities in buying P42 billion worth of face masks, face shields, personal protective equipment and other medical supplies for the Department of Health.