Caraga Region: Pilot for GPBP Online System
By Bryan F. Edulzura
BUTUAN CITY, Oct. 15 (PIA) - Caraga region has
been chosen as one of the two regions in the country (along with Region 6) to
be piloted for the implementation online reporting and monitoring system of
Grassroots Participatory Budget Process (GPBP).
The system allows agencies, projects beneficiaries, stakeholders and
even ordinary citizen to submit report, know status of project, and send feedbacks
anytime and anywhere on real time.
The selection was made by the World Bank and the
central offices of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) and Department
of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) through its GPBP Project Management
Office (PMO).
Caraga was chosen primarily because of the
smooth implementation of the GPBP project in this part of the country. “We laud DILG Region 13 Regional Director and
Regional Poverty Reduction Action Team (RPRAT) Chair, Lilibeth Famacion, for a
job well done,” said Richard Villacorte, Assistant Project Manager of the GPBB
PMO. “Implementation is efficient and incidence of project replacements and
complaints received were very minimal in the region”, he continued.
According to World Bank’s Makiko Watanabe, “GPBP
creates a platform where conventional upward accountability [where ROs report
to NGA Cos] can be interfaced with downward accountability [where ROs and LGUs
are held accountable by the citizens].”
The online reporting system and monitoring will
be launched early next year and is expected to strengthen the principles of
transparency and accountability and improve people participation in local
development planning and monitoring.
In the meantime, a GPBP public disclosure
portal, Phase I of the online reporting system, is expected to be launched this
later this month. Once online, everyone will be able to see the project list
funded under GPBP. (DILG-13/PIA-Caraga)
