AnaKalusugan party-list Rep. Michael “Mike” Defensor, a candidate for mayor of Quezon City, claimed that a “new” Commission on Audit (COA) report “questioned the validity” of P479-million worth of COVID-19 relief goods procured in 2020.
This is false.
STATEMENT
In a Jan. 23 press release, Defensor, who has been throwing the same allegations since September 2021, said:
“In a new report published on the COA website, state auditors said the Quezon City government’s purchases violated the Procurement Law and its implementing regulations, as well as accounting rules.”
Source: Mike Defensor Official Facebook Page, Media Release (Archive), Jan. 23, 2022
FACT
According to the agency’s database, the COA annual audit report, which Defensor cited, was published on its website on July 19, 2021, or eight months ago.
The COA report did not say it found violations of procurement laws in the transactions. In fact, lawyer Resurreccion Quieta, COA’s state auditor for Quezon City, gave the local government unit (LGU) an “unmodified opinion” for 2020, the highest rating the city has received at least in the past 10 years.
Read the full story on VERA Files Fact Check.
