The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office has been named one of the best performing Government-Owned and Controlled Corporations for 2017 and listed in the “billionaires row” of the Department of Finance.
President Rodrigo Duterte and House Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo led the awarding Wednesday in Malacañang.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez II joined Duterte and Arroyo in giving the awards to the GOCCs.
“This is a remarkable financial achievement. The same top contributors I mentioned earlier including now, the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office, made this feat possible,” Dominguez said.
“Our agency is going stronger than ever with its multi-billion lottery industry with P55 billion to P60 billion projected revenues this year,” PCSO general manager Alexander Balutan said.
Joining Balutan in receiving the award—Certificate of Acknowledgement of Dividend Remittances—during a simple ceremony at the Malacañang Palace was PCSO Chairman Anselmo Simeon Pinili.
“Seven out of 54 GOCCs remitted at least P1 billion, representing 69 percent of total remittances or P22.052 billion, and this is where PCSO ranked 5th,” Balutan said.
“We are very proud. We were seated at the front row they called ‘The Billionaires Row’ from among all the GOCCs. Actually, [‘yung dividends] malaking tulong ito sa mga pagawaing bayan, especially sa mga utilities (e.g. electricity, water), and other infrastructures to beef up the economy,” he added.
According to Dominguez, out of 125 GOCCs, 54 have remitted a total P32.03 billion to the National Treasury from January to July 2018.
Pursuant to Section 3 of Republic Act 7656, all GOCCs are required to declare and remit at least 50 percent of their annual net earnings as cash, stock, or property dividends to the National Government.
The total dividend collections in the first seven months of this year already exceeded the full-year total of P27.73-billion dividends contributed by GOCCs in 2016 and P30.46 billion in 2017.
“The dividends will help offset the subsidies we need to pay out to the GOCCs performing crucial social missions. They will go a long way in helping us hold down deficits and continue funding the infrastructures and social program of President Duterte,” said Dominguez in his opening remarks.”‹
