The National Youth Commission (NYC) has been called out by the Commission on Audit (COA) for spending a total of P36.82 million on training and travel expenses.
In their report for 2022, state auditors found that the validity and appropriateness of these expenses couldn’t be confirmed because of poor planning, lack of proper documentation, and incorrect processing of the commission’s activities.
One of the expenses that caught their attention was P1.28 million spent on excessive hotel room reservations for summits attended by NYC and Sangguniang Kabataan leaders in various parts of the country, such as Boracay, Baguio City, Bohol, Batangas, and Ilocos Norte.
The NYC defended some of the flagged expenses by explaining that some hotel rooms were left unoccupied because participants didn’t show up for various reasons, including testing positive for COVID-19.
The audit report mentioned that the NYC agreed to follow the recommendations of the audit team, which means they will improve their planning for projects and ensure that all expenses go through proper review and approval processes.
They will also ask relevant employees to provide missing documents to justify the expenses.
Another concern raised by the audit team was the spending of P1.03 million on “excessive” tokens. These tokens were given out in larger quantities than necessary for the participants.
The NYC, in response, assured the audit team that they will take necessary actions to address these issues.
On June 1, 2023, the NYC Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Ronald Gian Carlo Cardema, received a copy of the report.
Source: PhilNews24 | August 3, 2023
