The Commission on Audit (CoA) chided officials of the Philippine National Railways (PNR) for overshooting 20 times over the budget allocated for miscellaneous expenses mainly for “meetings and official entertainments.”
In its audit observation for 2011, CoA asked general manager Junio Ragragio and four other PNR officials to submit comments on the observations made by an audit team that examined the state-run railway firm’s finances.
“We found out that in the replenishments for working fund of the PNR disbursing officer that expenses for meetings and official entertainments were incurred during the year by the Office of the General Manager, Legal Division and in the meetings of the Board of Directors totalling P1.46 million,” the audit team led by Mayola Salita said.
Salita added allotted fund for Extraordinary and Miscellaneous Expenses in the corporate operating budget of the PNR should be limited to “a mere P72,000” if the provisions of the approved General Appropriations Act (GAA) are to be followed.
According to CoA, the PNR management has not proposed any budget for representation expense for the year.
“Also, the approved budget for Miscellaneous Expense of P3.62 million wherein the expenses for office representation were charged vis-a-vis the actual cost of Other MOOE (maintenance and other operating expenses) amounting to P4.11 million in the trial balance as at Dec. 31, 2012 revealed overspending by the PNR,” the audit team stated in its findings.
Aside from Ragragio, also asked to explain were Rafael Mozura, assistant general manager; Lynna Chung, manager for administration and finance department; Juana Samson, manager for controllership division and Rosendo Calleja, manager for budget and cash division.
CoA stressed guidelines for the disbursement of extraordinary and miscellaneous expenses for government-owned and -controlled corporations are provided under CoA Circular 2006-001.
“The objective is to ensure the prevention of irregular, unnecessary, excessive, extravagant or unconscionable uses of government funds,” CoA auditors said.
They added a ceiling on the amount of disbursement should follow what is prescribed in the corporate charter or from authority derived from the amount fixed in the GAA.