“We were scammed,” DepEd Mandaue City administrative officer Dr. Edgar Espina bluntly commented recently when asked about their Special Education Fund (SEF) shortfall for 2025.
At the core of his comment was the P744 million SEF for 2025 that was dangled to them through the Treasury Operations Review Unit (TORU) of the city’s past administration headed by no less than Atty. Regal Oliva, then the city treasurer who as reports have it, signed a “Certificate of Availability of Funds” for the said amount.
But lo and behold, that amount is very high compared to what is realistic as the city is just poised to collect P281 million for the year thereby creating a huge shortage which will affect their programs and prior procurements.
In effect, whatever has been considered a done deal has not been materialized which resulted to a lacking amount of at least P305 million as DepEd Mandaue already made procurements and disbursements amounting to P587 million.
As provided for in the law, RA 5447, SEF matters as it would be use for conduct of extension classes, classroom repairs, scholarships, salaries of teachers, etc. but since the money is not enough, it will now be a burden of the administration of Mayor Jonkie Ouano on where to get the funds for the said purpose.
And all because of Regal Oliva, that lawyer turned blogger, who really messed up on her (she is proud to be called as transgender woman) job while sitting as Mandaue City treasurer in the first half of 2024 when the 2025 SEF was laid down.
There were insinuations that Oliva might have done it intentionally since 2025 is an election year but more than that, it was really about how Oliva committed an over projection on the additional 1% collection from the Real Property Taxes (RPT) of the city where the funds would be obtained.
Historically, the city has an average collection of P300M per year for SEF but Oliva suddenly spiked his projection to P744 which caused the problem.
Mandaue City administrator Atty. Gonzalo Malig-on presented solid data to blame Oliva for the mess up, revealing that the city just collected β±298 million in 2023, about β±321 in 2024 and so why on earth did Oliva increased it more than double for 2025?
βThis was a serious miscalculation. Itβs impossible to more than double the SEF allocation in just one year when the law limits it to 1% of actual RPT collections.β Malig-on quipped.
So there you have it, because of the calculation boo-boo of Oliva (for command responsibility, dismissed Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes was also responsible), DepEd Mandaue is now in a problematic situation with their SEF.
It was indeed a “miscalculation” of Regal Oliva, not a minor one, it’s bigtime.
Pardon the French, na-TORU ra sila ni Oliva pero wala diay klaro!
(the P744M projected 2025 SEF collection of former Mandaue City Treasurer Regal Oliva vis-a-vis the P281M expected actual collection for the year)
(the P298M actual SEF collection in 2023 and the P321M for 2024)
