Coop board blind on Digao's fund deals

Coop federation insiders revealed that no board resolution had ever supported the withdrawals made by former Bohol Poverty Reduction Management Office (BPRMO) head and now Carmen Councilor Primo Digao from the account of the Federation of BPRMO Agricultural Cooperatives of Eastern Bohol.

This was according to Matildi Campoamor, the chairperson of the Federation of BPRMO Agricultural Cooperatives of Eastern Bohol, during the March 28 hearing of the probe team.

The absence of board resolution to support any withdrawal of funds has been identified as among the violations of coop laws and regulations.

In the liquidation papers that Limboy submitted to the probe team, she enumerated fund releases made for gasoline expenses of Rolando Paloso, a BPRMO staff.

Paloso confirmed it but said he thought the funds were taken from the regular office budget of BPRMO and not from admin cost to which Limboy charged it.

Paloso also confirmed that he had attended a meeting where it was discussed that an amount of money would be lent to community organizers whose salaries were delayed then. But he said he had no idea about the source of the fund.

The issue on this particular meeting cropped up during the previous hearing of the probe team, where the meeting reportedly discussed about a P200-thousand funding.

On the other hand, Limboy explained that only the P2-million assistance fund was covered with project proposal.

In the project proposal, the P2-million financial assistance that the provincial government released through BPRMO to the federation was for the household security and agribusiness of the 20-member cooperatives of the federation where its supposed breakdown was P500,000 for consumers; P500,000 for vegetables and fruits; P500,000 for livestock/poultry; and P500,000 for fabrication.

However, the audit report showed that actual expenses incurred were for meals and travel allowances, gasoline, purchase of cellular phones, delivery truck, personal computers, cash advances of personnel and other expenses. The disallowed purchases amounted to P1,928,831.

It was also noted in the same audit report that supposed official receipts and acknowledgement receipts were hand-written. The fund spent without any support of official receipts amounted to P10,436.75.

For his part, BPRMO head Antonieto Pernia had submitted documents to the probe team documents proving that there were activities on training done, to refute allegations that he was responsible for ghost trainings.

Maricar Fuentes, another BPRMO insider, testified that indeed there were trainings held for coop members.

BPRMO office clerk Mitzie Llorente, a regular employee who handles funds, aside from Patricia Limboy, also furnished the probe team, a copy of the documents that she had submitted to COA enumerating the expenditures charged to admin cost.