The Commission On Audit Found Out About Dead Veterans Getting Monthly Pensions
5721 – Commission On Audit (COA) discovered 5721 veterans still getting monthly pensions last year (2018) despite being dead long ago.
Retired soldiers are entitled to monthly pensions. For serving the country and putting their lives at risk, pensions offer a small assistance for them when they retire.
Meanwhile, the state’s auditors have recently found out about dead veterans still getting monthly pensions.
However, the Philippine Veterans Affairs (PVAO) refutes the existence of dead veterans receiving benefits. The office said no money for pension is missing.
COA’s audit of PVAO’s financial activities in 2018, reported that the office had about P70.25 million amount of expenses for the benefits of dead veterans and attached beneficiaries.
COA also stated that PVAO made attempts to recover the missing amount. However, by the end of the year 2019, the office only recovered P33.79 million, less than half of the reported amount.
They added that the rediscovered amount was set to be forwarded to the national strongbox, the case was considered a violation of Republic Act No. 10964, otherwise known as General Appropriations Act of 2018.
But the amount was kept in its servicing banks.
Handling the pensions for veterans and their legitimate dependents are done by the following banks:
- Land Bank of the Philippines,
- Philippine Veterans Bank,
- Development Bank of the Philippines,
- United Coconut Planters Bank, and
- Asia United Bank and Maybank.
Other corporations that handle pensions are the
- Armed Forces and Police Savings and Loan Association Inc.,
- Composite Wing Savings and Loan Association Inc., and
- Air Materiel Wing Savings and Loan Association Inc.
This is according to an article from Inquirer.
The Commission on Audit eventually gave directions to PVAO ordering the office to submit the recovered amount directly to the Bureau of Treasury.
That is all there is to it, at least for now. We’ll post updates as soon as we got them.