Republic of the Philippines

COMMISSION ON AUDIT
Regional Office No. IV-A
Audit Team R4A-08, Audit Group NGS-3-B
Office of the Auditor
Commonwealth Avenue, Quezon City
___________________________________________________________________________

AOM No. 2018-011

Date: October 22, 2018

AUDIT OBSERVATION MEMORANDUM (AOM)

For: Atty. Juanito O. Icaro

Regional Election Director
Commission on Elections
Regional Office No. IVA
Intramuros, Manila

Attention: Atty. Patrick Enaje

Provincial Election Supervisor
Province of Laguna

Mr. Edgardo Marfil

Election Officer-City of Sta. Rosa

We have conducted examination of the cash and accounts of Mr. Edgardo Marfil,
Election Officer (EO), City of Sta. Rosa, Province of Laguna on October 19, 2018 and
observed the following deficiencies:

COMELEC’s income on voter’s certification fees with undetermined amount were

collected and receipted by the Local Government of Sta. Rosa but were not remitted
to COMELEC contrary to Section 69 of Presidential Decree (PD) No. 1445 due to
unavailability of COMELEC’s official receipts, hence, depriving the COMELEC of
the income that will be derived therefrom.

Section 69 of PD 1445 states that public officers authorized to receive and collect
money arising from taxes, revenues and receipts of any kind shall remit or deposit intact
the full amounts so received and collected by them to the treasury or the agency
concerned and credited to the particular accounts to which the said money belongs.

The audit team noted that during the times that the office of the Election Officer
(EO) of Sta. Rosa has no available COMELEC official receipts (ORs), and that the
constituents of the city requests for a voter’s certification, the said EO requests the Local
Government of Sta. Rosa to issue official receipts on its behalf using the Local
Government ORs. The EO reasoned out that they request the Local Government to issue
ORs because those requesting for voter’s certification, especially those which will be
used for filing of passport application need the ORs.

Further verification revealed that the total amount of the issued ORs by the local
government could not be accounted since no monitoring and control being implemented
by the office of the EO as to the number of requests for voter’s certification that have
been issued by the local government.

We recommend that the Regional Election Director (RED):

 direct the EO of Sta. Rosa City to request from the COMELEC Main
office thru the Provincial Election Supervisor for COMELEC ORs so as
not to refer payees to the local government for the issuance of ORs;

 instruct the EO of Sta. Rosa City to request the local government of Sta.
Rosa City to remit the entrusted collections of the COMELEC; and

 Require the PES to coordinate with the local government of Sta. Rosa
City regarding remittances of COMELEC collections.

May we have your comments on the foregoing audit observation within fifteen
(15) calendar days upon receipt hereof.

MARIA VICTORIA D. ALBANO

Audit Team Leader

RODOLFO M. ASUNCION
OIC-Regional Supervising Auditor
(Concurrent)

Proof of Receipt of AOM:

Atty. Juanito O. Icaro

Regional Election Director
Date: ______________

Atty. Patrick Enaje

Provincial Election Supervisor-Laguna Province
Date: _____________

Mr. Edgardo Marfil

Election Officer Sta. Rosa City
Date: _________