THE Commission on Audit has affirmed the finding of its auditors that the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) paid its executives and employees Performance Based Bonuses (PBB) 10 years ago at 141 percent in excess of what was allowed by the Governance Commission on GOCCs (GCG).
In a 12-page decision released this week, the COA en banc said all 2,168 personnel of the state-owned bank are required to pay back the excess amounts they received since the Civil Code of the Philippines defines the receipt of something without legal ground as “unjust enrichment” and that the receiver has the obligation to return the same under the principle of solutio indebiti.
On the other hand, the bank’s officials who approved and certified the amounts paid were held jointly obligated to refund the net disallowed amount after deducting the sum paid by the rank-and-file employees who were just passive recipients of the PBB.
Auditors said the total bonuses paid amounted to P299,820,352.08 but a computation based on the amounts set by the GCG in Memorandum Circular No. 2015-05 showed only P123.974 million was valid hence the balance totaling P175,846,761.87 must be refunded.
The March 21, 2023 re-computation undertaken by the audit team showed 63 DBP senior executives received P70.39 million although the GCG memorandum circular only allowed P17.15 million or an excess of P53.24 million that must be returned.
On the other hand, 556 junior officials were paid a total of P120.59 million against the allowable amount of only P48.39 million or an excess of P72.206 million.
The 1,549 personnel classified as rank and file received P108.84 million of which only P58.44 million was valid or an excess of P50.4 million.
“The AT (audit team) disallowed the payment to DBP’s officials and employees of PBB …for being irregular and excessive. The multipliers used went beyond the cap that may be provided by a GOCC for the grant of the PBB,” the Commission said.
COA Chairperson Gamaliel A. Cordoba and Commissioners Roland Café Pondoc and Mario Lipana signed the decision.
While the bank’s approving officials invoked good faith, the Commission said this is untenable since, owing to their positions, they are “expected to have knowledge of the laws, rules or regulations.”
“They were performing discretionary function because before approving the transactions, they are not precluded from raising reasonable questions on the funding, legality, regularity, necessity, or economy of the expenditure. The presumption of good faith fails when an explicit law, rule or regulation has been violated, as in this case,” the COA said.
