MikeLigalig.com

Twenty-five million pesos worth of furniture for different public schools in Bohol are under close watch to avoid corruption.

Department of Education (DepEd) - Bohol Division Supt. Elpidio Jala said his agency is widening its eyes in tandem with the anti-graft civil society group Procurement Watch, Incorporated (PWI) to ensure the quality and quantity of deliveries.

The DepEd-PWI watch, also known nationwide as the Bantay Eskuwela, was launched in an apt ceremony at the Manga High School here, which is one of the three public schools in Bohol to pilot the vigilant crusade "fitting the pieces towards governance."

The two other pilot schools are the Cogon Night High School, also in Tagbilaran City, and Bugang Elementary School in San Miguel, according to Adonis Barraquias, chief of the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) Secretariat of DepEd Central Office, and PWU-Bantay Eskuwela Project Manager Caroline Belisario.

The immediate monitoring target of the watchdog is the on-going P10-million furniture delivery to different Bohol schools using the fund allocated in 2008 and the P15-million allocation for school year 2009-2010.
         
Jala clarified, however, that there is no malice in the choice of the three aforementioned schools as pilot schools since they were picked at random from the DepEd Regional Office list of Bohol schools where furniture are to be delivered.

The present procurement program for Bohol school furniture includes 5,817 classroom tables, 11,534 chairs, 230 teacher's tables and 230 corresponding chairs for teacher's tables.

The school procurement reform watch launching was also witnessed by DepEd - Tagbilaran City Division officials led by Supt. Norma Varquez, and local civil society and private sector groups.

Jala welcomed the DepEd-PWI collaboration, citing that the government lost millions in the past to school furniture from Mindanao made only of bangkal, a tree of far inferior wood quality often used to make dead poor's coffins.

The Bantay Eskuwela will monitor the procurement and delivery of not just school furniture in the near future with the assistance of the concerned schools' Parents-Teachers Community Associations (PTCAs) and Bohol Association of Non-Government Organizations (BANGON).

It is a timely response to the findings of the Commission on Audit (COA) on the P33.8 million wastage due to substandard furniture delivered to the schools in certain provinces last year.

DepEd's allocation for school furniture nationwide amounted to P1 billion last year, and a great bulk of deliveries is yet scheduled this season or mid-2009.

Meanwhile, the yearly pre-class opening Brigada Eskuwela will start tomorrow with a caravan around the province.

Brigada Eskuwela is a one-week bayanihan program every year to repair and prepare the schools and their facilities for the next opening of classes.

The caravan will move out of the city at 6 a.m. tomorrow to Sierra Bullones at noon via Baclayon, Alburquerque, Loboc, Bilar, Batuan and Carmen. The formal program launching will be done in Sierra Bullones, the town being a Brigada Eskuwela national awardee.

The caravan proceeds to Pilar, Alicia, Ubay and Trinidad until it reaches Talibon and drives back to the city passing Getafe, Buenavista, Inabanga, Clarin, Tubigon, Calape, Loon, Maribojoc and Cortes. (Ven rebo Arigo) - The Bohol Chronicle

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