First posted at 5:24 pm here: Breaking News: Commission on Audit Chair Grace Pulido-Tan said five minutes ago that she estimated that about six billion pesos would be disallowed by the COA of the fund releases made to Napoles NGOs. She made this statement  at today’s oral arguments in the Supreme Court on the legal challenges to the constitutionality of the  PDAF/ pork barrel. The COA chair was referring to the fund releases made by the DBM and implementing agencies with the concurrence of lawmakers covered by the 2012 COA Special Audit Report.

         The COA Chair made the revelation in answer to Supreme Court Justice Lucas Bersamin’s query on what would happen to the funds released to the Napoles NGOs that did not go to thru the procedures prescribed by the procurement law. The COA chair answered that such expenditures would be disallowed by the COA. Justice Bersamin then asked whether there would be criminal liability, and the COA chair said that the disallowances are without prejudice to any criminal cases that would be filed. When asked as to the  amount of the disallowances, the COA Chair said she has yet to formalize her computation but said that she estimated that based on the transactions that did not follow the procurement law as stated in the 2012 COA Special Audit Report, there would be “thousands and thousands of disallowances and about six billion pesos…”

      The procurement law requires that a public bidding be conducted in the award of government contracts to contractors, suppliers, and service-providers. When a public expenditure is disallowed, the public officials responsible for the approval of the award and allotment would be asked to pay the amount from out of their own pocket without prejudice to administrative and criminal liability.

       The  COA Chair was asked by the Supreme Court to be present at today’s oral arguments as an amicus curiae, which literally means a friend of the court, and refers to a resource person invited by the Court to provide information and expert opinion. 

    This morning, during a break at the APEC conference in Bali, the President said in a press briefing that he would not give up the PDAF and the Disbursement Accelerated Program.