Who?

Parties Involved:

When?
When was it discovered?

Where?
May be irrelevant.

What?
What happened in the process?

How?
Procurement Laws Violated:

Why?
Findings (partial):

1. title

2. intro background and history

3. issues (concrete)

4. public disclosure

5. current status

6. insights pillars of public procurement and good governance and sound fiscal administration

7. propose reforms regarding practices

 II.

The COVID-19 impacts all aspects of society, countries and cities across the world
entered lockdown with the closure of Cultural, sports venues, all non- essential businesses, and
sadly even schools. The pandemic caused a dramatic disruption in the delivery of education. In
order to give aid, the government responded by allocating funds to buy laptops to make sure
the teachers are equipped to continue their work. However, the act of the government to give
aid became controversial after the Commission on Audit (COA) asked the Department of
Education for an explanation for buying P2.4 billion worth of outdated laptops costing P58,300
each were bought through the Procurement Service of the Department of budget and
management or (PS-DBM). This came to an excess of P23,253.50 each unit while the contract’s
authorized budget was only set at P35,046.50 per unit. During the blue ribbon committee
hearing, A video that COA showed demonstrated a 30 second difference in boot speeds
between a laptop purchased using Bayanihan II funding and a different laptop with a
comparable market price of P50,000 to P60,000

Former DepEd undersecretary Alain Pascua, was questioned by senators on why he

agreed to the revised or new price set by the PS-DBM, which was P58,300 per unit, at the
senate blue ribbon committee hearing. Pascua then explained how the PS-DBM had provided
them with an action slip outlining the cost of the laptops before the purchase. Pascua also
added that the action slip was never addressed to the higher ups of the DepEd. And that it was
the Information technology director Abraham Abanil (who was under Pascua’s office that time)
who signed the concurrence on the action slip, in which there was an option to purchase
laptops in much more cheaper and reasonable price. Meanwhile, According to Abanil he
consulted Pascua about the action slip before signing it.

III. (issues)

The main issues in this procurement are that

IV. Public disclosre

This issue made rounds in mainstream media when news outlets such as Inquirer, GMA
7 and Rappler picked it up and reported about the said anomalies.

V. Current Status

Currently, a case has been filed by the ALS (Alternative learning system) blah blah blah.
More so, current DepEd chairperson Vice president Sarah Duterte has also requested COA to
investigate the same in order to find factual antecedents which may lead to the discovery of
fraudulent and malicious acts

VI. Insights (opinion mo and compare it to pillars etc)

VII.
VII.

In light of what happened with the DepEd and the issues regarding the laptops, I
strongly believe that it’s high time reforms with regard to procurement practices be put in place
https://www.theregister.com/2022/08/16/philippines_laptop_procurement_fraud_probe/

https://www.philstar.com/the-freeman/opinion/2022/10/28/2219889/deped-laptop-
controversy

https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1705286/senate-report-on-deped-laptop-probe-still-one-
signature-short

https://www.rappler.com/nation/why-commission-audit-flagged-deped-billions-worth-
outdated-laptops/

https://www.rappler.com/nation/deped-laptop-mess-who-allowed-ps-dbm-raise-process/

https://www.cnnphilippines.com/news/2022/10/23/DepEd-supplier-laptop-performance-
comparison.html

https://www.cnnphilippines.com/news/2022/8/11/Supplier-DepEd-laptops-meet-govt-
technical-requirements.html

https://www.gadgetpilipinas.net/2022/09/deped-laptop-no-legal-basis/

https://manilashaker.com/2-4-billion-worth-of-deped-laptops-are-likely-illegal/

https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1180605

https://www.gizguide.com/2022/08/deped-coa-audit-laptop.html

https://mb.com.ph/2022/09/29/outdated-laptops-issued-by-deped-rejected-returned-by-
teachers-group/