Education Secretary Leonor Magtolis-Briones said President Rodrigo Duterte was spot on when he declared the Commission on Audit (COA) should review the books of the Philippine Red Cross.
“On your (Duterte) observation about private agencies being subject to public audit. In my long life, I was involved in the preparation of the General Auditing Code, as secretary to the Commission on Audit. And there is a provision there which says that when public interest, when public funds are involved, then the Commission on Audit has the right to audit a private entity to trace whether it is beneficial to the people or not,” said Briones in a briefing.
“ I believe that provision is still there. I hope it is still there. And that is very important because public interest is at stake here,” she added.
Briones said that aside from the Constitution, the Audit Code or Presidential Decree 1445 was ” very, very specific that any transaction involving public interest and public funds has to be traced and audited whether it is public or private.”
PRC claimed that it was not covered by the COA audit because it was a “voluntary, independent, and autonomous, non-governmental organization.”
Duterte, however, said COA was mandated to audit PR because it was getting regular donations from the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) and Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor).
“Takot ka [ma-audit] kasi marami kang atraso over the years. We need to know nasaan na ang pera (where is the money), Senator Gordon. I am demanding an answer, and we will go over it with COA report which is a public document,” said Duterte.
The post Wrong Dick: Ex-COA executive Briones agrees with Duterte, gov’t should audit Red Cross first appeared on .Source: Latest Politics News Today (Politics.com.ph)
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