Press Release
September 24, 2009

Loren: Whatever happened to the P23-B Pag-Ibig earning?

Senator Loren Legarda said today that the P12-billion fund raising effort of the Pag-Ibig Fund raises more questions on Pag-Ibig's costly tri-media advertisements that featured its head, Vice President Noli De Castro.

"The fact that Mr. De Castro is the official concerned is just incidental. What we want to stress is that after spending millions of pesos in advertisements, Pag-Ibig is now trying to raise funds through the issuance of retail bonds," said Loren.

Loren last month grilled government officials over newspaper, television and radio advertisements featuring them, stressing that the use of taxpayers' money for such purposes should be minimized if not totally avoided.

In the case of the Pag-Ibig Fund, also known as the Home Development Mutual Fund, Loren said that it has a captive market composed of its members, thus there was hardly any need for De Castro to entice them to avail of Pag-Ibig's housing projects.

She said the P172 million spent by Pag-Ibig for De Castro's advertisements would have been better spent constructing more houses for members. She also doubted Pag-Ibig's explanation that the P172 million directly generated P23 billion in revenues.

"If P23 billion had been generated, why is there a need for Pag-Ibig to offer P12 billion in bonds in the next two months?" asked Loren, noting Pag-Ibig's own media announcement of the offering to be coursed through the Development Bank of the Philippines and First Metro Investment Corp.

"Most Pag-Ibig members avail of Pag-Ibig's benefits the moment they become qualified for the same. Likewise, if Pag-Ibig really wanted to reach out to its members, it has other ways of doing so without spending much."

"Pag-Ibig caters to people who are already members and not to the general public, thus its use of advertising was dubious as one advertises only to penetrate a market," she said.

She said Pag-Ibig should have just notified its members through their contact details, for example through the text messaging system or through electronic mail.

Aside from De Castro, the Senate Committee on Economic Affairs also questioned last month MMDA Chairman Bayani Fernando, Health Secretary Francisco Duque and Pacgor Chairman Efraim Genuino for the infomercials using taxpayer's money.

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