Philippine Sports Commission still has P387M debt to SEA Games suppliers

The Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) on Tuesday revealed that it still has more than P300 million worth of payables to various suppliers for the country’s hosting of the Southeast Asian Games (SEA) Games in 2019.

“Up to now, in fact, we have P387 million expenses, outstanding [payables],” PSC Executive Director Guillermo Iroy said during the Senate hearing on the 2021 budget of the PSC and Games and Amusement Board (GAB).

“We requested sa DBM an additional P387 million for the remaining payables from the different suppliers during the SEA Games,” Iroy said.

The PSC official said the sports agency has been receiving “too many” demand letters from suppliers.

“In fact some senators have also received demand letters from suppliers. So, we expect that this P387 million will soon be released by the DBM (Department of Budget and Management),” Iroy said.

The PSC official said that once the DBM releases the requested amount, it will be remitted to the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee (PSCOC), to pay the outstanding debt to SEA Games’ suppliers.

Iroy said the PSC will submit to the Senate a breakdown of the P387-million payables of the agency.

The PSC official said that the budget allocated for the SEA Games hosting is lower than the projections by the organizing committee.

“The estimated budget of the organizing committee was really P7.5 billion for the hosting [of SEA Games]. But it was reduced to P5 billion and luckily the Office of the President released another P1 billion that’s P6.5 billion,” he said.

“That is the reason why meron pang remaining [payables] because the actual budget forecasted by the organizing committee was P7.5 billion because of the program they have prepared for the hosting,” he added. -MDM, GMA News