Relaxed rules on idle govt assets’ sale sought
Credit to Author: MAYVELIN U. CARABALLO, TMT| Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2019 16:26:15 +0000
THE Commission on Audit’s (CoA) rules on disposing idle government assets must be relaxed to allow state agencies to sell serviceable properties, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez 3rd said.
In a statement, the Department of Finance (DoF) quoted Dominguez as saying that CoA Circular 89-296, which required such assets to be sold at their appraised values, had hampered, rather than facilitated, government efforts to dispose them.
According to the circular, issued 30 years ago, idle but serviceable government properties should be divested, either through public auction, negotiated sale, barter, or transfer to other government agencies, based on those values.
Because of this, Dominguez has directed the Privatization Management Office (PMO) and the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. (PDIC) to discuss with state-run banks and CoA ways to loosen up these rules.
“I want a meeting organized with the CoA — mainly with the representatives from PMO, PDIC [and] the two (state) banks we have,” Dominguez said, referring to Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank) and the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP).
“The central bank may want to participate,” he added.
“Tell them that this CoA requirement that we sell at market value isn’t working, because we just keep on adding to the titles, particularly with the PDIC, and we’re just getting overwhelmed.”
The Finance chief said that, rather than continue imposing these ineffective rules, the state would be better off selling them at discounted prices that would attract more buyers, [who would then] be able to redevelop these properties for productive or commercial use.
“The objective is to ask CoA to cooperate with us and propose ways of turning these assets into cash, because cash helps the economy. Selling it even at a discount allows (these assets) to be redeveloped and used. Right now, it’s just an expense,” he added.
Unproductive or idle state assets, Dominguez said, only add to the state’s financial burden, considering that taxes have to be paid and personnel have to be hired to keep these properties serviceable.
For its part, the PMO, an attached to the DoF, said the state-run deposit insurer, LandBank, DBP and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas were among the state agencies that had been unable to sell because of the circular.
Dominguez also instructed the PMO to determine the number of land titles and properties held by the Finance department, the two state-run lenders, and other state agencies and government-owned and controlled corporations in preparation for the planned discussions with CoA officials.
Chief Privatization Officer Gerard Chan reported to Dominguez that the PMO alone has some 28,000 land titles to dispose of, while the PDIC has about 23,000 more.
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