Was DBM clueless about budget mess until Marcos' exposé?

Corruption thrives when the very agency tasked with ensuring the “equitable, prudent, transparent and accountable” use of public funds is kept blind to glaring budget anomalies.

- By BRIX LELIS

“I'd like to know when your office, or you personally, found out that something was wrong. When did you know that something was amiss?”

That was the question former socioeconomic planning chief Winnie Monsod fired at acting Budget Secretary Rolando Toledo, leaving the audience at the UP School of Economics’ (UPSE) E. Gokongwei lecture room in stunned silence last Friday.

Such things, Monsod continued, “don’t just explode - they build up.”

Toledo, who has been with the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) for almost four decades, said he first learned of the budget scandal when President Marcos brought it to light during his State of the Nation Address last year.

Budget anomalies, Toledo noted, can only be identified when the Commission on Audit (COA), working with the heads of different agencies, conducts validations, site visits or monitoring of ongoing projects.

“First, they should be aware at the agency level.

The facade of the Department of Budget and Management building in Manila.

NOTES ON THE BEAT Was DBM From B1 Second, the COA should have noticed it as well, and that should have been reported," said Toledo, who took the helm of the DBM late last year after his predecessor, Amenah Pangandaman resigned amid the corruption scandal.

"So whatever report that we receive, that's the basis for us to say that the projects are being implemented. So that's from our end," he said.