MANILA, (PNA) — Affirming the Administration’s commitment to ensure the well-being of the country’s war veterans, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) released P2.9 billion for the unpaid Total Administrative Disability (TAD) Pension of some 16,980 living World War II veterans, upon validation of the proposed beneficiary list submitted by the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office (PVAO).
DBM secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad reported that the latest release will support the pension requirements of validated veterans from 1994 to 2012, chargeable against the Pension and Gratuity Fund (PGF).
“This release supports the government’s budgetary assistance to our living war veterans and their families. It is likewise in fulfillment of President Aquino’s pledge to ensure that timely pension payments are made to our World War II veterans who fought bravely for the country and sacrificed much in the process,” Abad said.
Department of National Defense (DND) secretary Voltaire Gazmin also reported that PVAO was able to generate P4 billion in savings in 2010, primarily due to the implementation of Automated Teller Machines (ATM) in delivering pension benefits. This amount enabled the agency to pay arrears for TAD of WWII veterans from 2003 to 2009, he said.
The DBM compared the list of living WWII veterans submitted by PVAO with the list of regular Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) pensioners who are considered veterans by virtue of their age. This process of validation was facilitated to ensure that only veterans who served during WWII and in Vietnam and Korea would be included in the fund release, Abad said.
“Since making the switch from check to electronic payments for our veterans’ pensions, we were able to update the pensioner database and clear it of ghost entries, allowing us as well to improve transparency and accountability in the government’s pension payment,” he said.
Abad added that even more notable is the fact that digitization measures like this have enabled us to successfully generate savings, which can be used to support future releases for unpaid pension arrears.