BORACAY Island, Aklan — The Department of Information and Communications and Technology (DICT) said it is seeking the advice of the Commission on Audit (COA) on what to do over the 866 laptops and 12,482 tablets currently being held in its stockroom.
Earlier, the COA flagged the DICT for failing to distribute around P93-million worth of laptops and tablets that the Duterte administration had procured.
The gadgets were intended for the DICT’s Cybersafe Learning for Education (CLE) program but remained undistributed 17 months after their purchase.
In an interview, DICT secretary Ivan John Uy admitted that resolving the issue is proving to be quite a challenge for the agency.
“To my understanding, the laptops were purchased first without intended recipients. Another [issue] is that the funds used to purchase the laptops and tablets seem to have come from another source. We want to be careful on how to resolve this issue that’s why we are seeking the advice of COA on what could be the best resolution,” he said.
Uy was here at LA Carmella-Boracay on Friday, Aug. 27, as keynote speaker on the tenth Visayas ICT Organization (VICTOR) conference. According to organizers, around 300 participants coming from various ICT partners in the Visayas attended the event.
