Forty-three mayors will be issued show cause orders for allegedly committing various infractions in relation to the distribution of the cash aid under the Social Amelioration Program (SAP), the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) said on Thursday.
DILG Secretary Eduardo M. Año said the 43 local chief executives (LCEs) will have to explain “why they had poor performance despite the two extensions of the deadline given to local government units (LGUs) with the latest deadline ending on 12 midnight of May 10’’.
“While the vast majority of the LGUs were able to distribute their SAP before the deadline leading to a national pay-out rate of 97 percent yesterday, may ilan pa rin na naiwan, thus, the DILG and the public deserves to know why they failed to complete their distribution,” said Año.
Año said that the 43 mayors will have to provide reasonable explanations on why they should not be sanctioned as about three percent of low-income families have not received their cash grants as of May 13.
He noted that the 43 LGUs had 79 percent and below accomplishment rate as of the final deadline.
The DILG chief said that 11 of these mayors are in Western Visayas, eight are in MIMAROPA, five in Central Visayas, four in the Davao Region, and four in the National Capital Region.
Año added that the LGUs with poor distribution rate and did not meet the May 10 deadline include two localities in Ilocos Region, two in Cagayan Valley; two in CALABARZON, two in Eastern Visayas, two in Northern Mindanao and one in Central Luzon.
DILG Undersecretary and spokesperson Jonathan Malaya clarified that graft and corruption cases related to the handling of the SAP fund will now be investigated by the Philippine National Police (PNP) – Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) and no longer by the DILG field offices.
Malaya assured that Año will not tolerate a single instance of graft and corruption.
He added that the PNP will also be in charge of all SAP- related anomalies committed by rogue barangay officials. (Chito A. Chavez)
