coop high

1 Comments:

At 5:04 AM,  erik said...

Dear friends at Lamac MPC:

I would to share COOPNATCCO's statement on the PDAF and campaign fund contributions:


April 25, 2007

COOP NATCCO Denies Election Violations, Says its Campaign Financing is Transparent and Accountable


In response to a news story (“Pork barrel dangled by co-op party list,” by Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon) appearing in Philippine Daily Inquirer on April 24, 2007, the Coop NATCCO Network Party vehemently denies that it dangles pork barrel funds to attract votes and that it violates election laws regulating campaign contributions.

“Coop NATCCO does not promise co-ops a share in its PDAF funds. What it promises is that its members, including cooperatives, would have the right and privilege to determine the party’s policy in the allocation of the Priority Development Assistance Fund or PDAF,” said Cresente Paez, Coop NATCCO Party President.

“Our campaign promise is to increase the budget for agriculture, basic infrastructures, education and training, information technology, water supply and other basic needs, and to make these even more available to benefit the rural and urban poor,” Paez said. “What we promise is that they will have a say in the Party’s policy on the allocation of these projects,” Paez added.

“We believe that these development projects can benefit the poor even more if these are implemented through partnerships between local governments, which are the actual recipients of the PDAF-supported projects, and the local cooperatives, which are composed mainly of the poor and which are capable of co-managing such projects,” Paez explained.

“Coop NATCCO’s Party Directorate, composed of co-op representatives from all over the country, has a long standing policy of allowing the party chapters and co-ops to identify the most needed projects in their respective communities and to propose such projects for funding by the PDAF. It may happen that localities that generate the most number of votes for Coop NATCCO are given priority in the allocation of PDAF funding, however this is just one of the criteria for the allocation of PDAF since some areas that generate less number of votes for the Party may receive more development assistance,” Paez further explained.

“Our policy on PDAF allocation is participatory, transparent, and accountable. This is in contrast to the opaque and arbitrary way others dispense their PDAF allocation. During its term, Coop NATCCO supported infrastructure projects and computers to poorer communities through 260 co-ops and 31 local governments; school buildings, computers, and textbooks to 53 public schools; scholarship programs; and health insurance. It should be noted that Coop NATCCO reports all its PDAF allocations to the PDAF Watch, an independent, non-government monitoring initiative on the pork barrel undertaken by the Caucus of Development NGO Networks or Code NGO,” Paez added.

Coop NATCCO’s Legal Counsel Atty. Rubi Mayor explained that Mr. Jose Ping-ay’s statement during a talk to co-ops in Baguio City does not constitute violation of COMELEC Resolution No. 7794.

“Contrary to the report, he was not promising that co-ops will actually receive shares from Coop NATCCO’s PDAF allocation. Mr. Ping-ay was merely citing the party policy that co-ops shall have the privilege of identifying and proposing development projects within their area in the proportion of the number of votes that they are able to deliver,” explained Atty. Mayor.

“Coop NATCCO strictly complies with the provisions of the Omnibus Election Code and COMELEC Resolution No. 7794 since it started participating in the first party list elections. The law allows candidates to receive contributions so long as the true names of the contributors are disclosed and a report of the contributions is submitted to the COMELEC. Coop NATCCO has always received contributions from its members, including co-ops engaged in savings and credit services. The names of these contributors and the amount of their contributions have always been reported to the COMELEC since 1998,” said Atty. Mayor.

 

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