AS the House of Representatives will resume its three-week session tomorrow, leaders have pledged to expedite the passage of a proposed law seeking to abolish the Road Board to prevent the misuse of billions of pesos in road user’s tax.
Surigao del Sur Rep. Johnny Pimentel, chairman of the House committee on good government and public accountability, said Congress would immediately work on the passage of House Bill No. 6236 authored by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez seeking to abolish the Road Board and transfer its functions to the Department of Public Works and Highways and Department of Transportation.
“The Road Board is allegedly a source of corruption for some of its officials since it was established and I totally agree with the proposal for its abolition. Many previous officials of the Road Board have allegedly amassed millions of pesos through kickbacks,” he said.
He said Congress resumes session tomorrow and will adjourn sine die next week or June 1 to end the second regular session of the 17th Congress.
Over the years, the Commission on Audit has uncovered illegal utilization of the Road Fund estimated to have amounted to P90.72 billion from 2001 to December 2012, Pimentel said.
“Obviously, the Road Board is just another layer of bureaucracy, which became another avenue for graft and corruption,” he said.
Alvarez citing CoA reports, said some P515.50 million of the Road Fund was used in 2004 to 2008 for payment of salaries, allowances, maintenance and other operating expenses, which were properly chargeable to the regular budget.
In 2011, P62.52 million of the Road Fund was used for the Road Board’s engineering and administrative overhead expenses, according to CoA.
In 2013, CoA uncovered findings of irregularities in the use of more than P1.66 billion of the funds.
Alvarez said CoA pointed out that from 2001 to 2010 there were discrepancies amounting to P1.495 billion in the total collection of Road User’s Tax between the collections declared by the Land Transportation Office and the certification from the Bureau of Treasury.
In filing HB No. 6236, Alvarez noted that the Road Board was created under Republic Act No. 8794, which imposed a motor vehicle users’ charge on owners of all types of motor vehicles.
