INSTEAD of clearly showing what they have done for Bohol province, the local politicians instead bannered their faces in calendars worth P2.4 million.

This was in essence the 2011 audit disallowance of the Commission on Audit (COA) for the island of Bohol when the government agency reviewed 122,850 pieces of calendars worth P2.43 million.

However, the Bohol officials said that the calendars were not advertisements and followed the rule of accountability.

State auditors noted that the local government of Bohol paid in four tranches to SBP Printers, the payment of calendars that listed the accomplishment report of elected officials in 2010.

In a breakdown, the payments were dated January 27, 2011, worth P107,000 for 5,350 pieces of calendars; February 2, worth P80,000 for 5,000 pieces; March 18, worth P2 million for 50,000 pieces; and May 5, worth P250,000 for 12,500 pieces.

The commission said that the procurement was disallowed during pre-audit because the “transaction is considered unnecessary,” since a standing COA circular mandates government offices to adopt austerity measures.

There was also no list of recipients and acknowledgement receipts were not attached. During post-audit, auditors noted that the accomplishments from July to December 2010 were indicated in the calendars but “the spaces were dominated by pictures of officials showing their various activities rather than the calendar dates or the accomplishments.”

Also noted were the “very small letter fonts [in one type of calendar] that cannot almost be read or deciphered.”

Half of the entire space in other calendars “was filled with the pictures of provincial and other agency officials” with one-liner captions of their programs.

“This kind of details in a print media could be considered private and per-sonal in nature. Thus, it has to be paid from private fund,” auditors noted.

In a reply, the provincial government said that the calendars were not advertisements.

“[The calendars] were not issued for the purpose of promotion of any nature. These were meant to highlight the accomplishments of the two branches of the provincial government,” the reply read.

The officials added that the issuance of posters were “cognizant” of their accountability since they included in the calendars their projects and programs.

“We [Bohol officials] fail to see how the mere inclusion of said officials’ pictures in a summary of their accomplishments should make the whole exercise ‘private and personal in nature,’” the reply added.

Also, the P2.4-million expense for the calendars could not be extravagant, as auditors alleged, because they were only single-sheet posters printed on standard board paper.

In a rejoinder, government auditors agreed that the calendars were aimed to “apprise the electorate” on the programs of the local government.

However, the Audit office insisted that they were correcting the form of information dissemination.

“We [auditors] are convinced that the accomplishments should have been given greater importance and not their pictures as public servants,” the rejoinder pointed out.

The commission asked the Bohol government to stop the expenses, which the Audit agency deemed personal and private in nature.

They also wanted the concerned officials of the province to submit legal basis and an explanation for the P2.4-million payment.