Sports gear gathering dust in PSC stock rooms

Philippine Sports Commission

MANILA, Philippines—They just lie there and gather dust.

Government auditors were shocked at the sight of piles of basketballs, shuttlecocks, badminton rackets and other sports supplies inside the stock rooms of the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC).

A team from the Commission on Audit inspected six stock rooms of the PSC in 2010 and came away with a bad impression.

“There is overstocking of various supplies such as rubber basketballs, badminton rackets, chessboards, table tennis balls and rackets, volleyballs, trophies, medals, T-shirts, umbrellas, jogging pants and shirts, etc.,” the COA said in its annual report.

In effect, “Scarce resources of government were tied up in slow-moving items,” it observed, adding that “resources used to purchase stocks could have been used to finance other projects of the PSC.”

The stock rooms were also not properly maintained and organized, it said.

Against the law

The supplies were purchased by the Arroyo administration, but COA reminded the sports agency that overstocking violated the Administrative Code of 1987 and the General Appropriations Act of 2010, which provide that inventory of supplies should not exceed normal three-month requirements.

The COA recommended that the management see to it that needed supplies are purchased to maximize the use of scarce resources, that it require its property office to prepare an inventory of stocks, and to refrain from buying supplies already available.

The management explained that the property office has not processed any request to purchase sports supplies in bulk quantities since Ricardo Garcia took over as chair.

The PSC was created in 1990 to serve as the policy-making and coordinating body of all amateur sports development programs.

Fund mess

In 2010, it received an appropriation of P319 million, an allotment of P263 million, and an income of P836 million from the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. and the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office.

The COA also observed that the National Sports Development Fund collection of P617.9 million could not be ascertained due to lack of supporting documents, and discrepancies in the recording of transactions.

It also noted that the financial assistance to national sports agencies or athletes running to P50 million were erroneously recorded as “outright expenses” instead of as “due from non-government organizations or people’s organizations account,” and were not backed by documentation.

Unliquidated financial assistance from 1990 to 2010 stood at P84.2 million, it added.