Dividends remitted by government-owned or -controlled corporations (GOCCs) breached the P40-billion mark in 2018, the highest amount ever collected since the law requiring state firms to hand over 50 percent of their annual net earnings to the national government was enacted in 1994.
The Department of Finance (DOF) said the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. (PDIC) remitted an additional P6 billion on December 14, which, combined with the P34.17 billion collected from GOCCs as of November, raised total remittances for 2018 to a record P40.17 billion. Including Land Bank of the Philippines, which should have contributed P7.82 billion, the amount of GOCC dividends totals P47.99 billion for 2018.
Finance Undersecretary Antonette Tionko, who heads the DOF-Corporate Affairs Group (CAG), said the Land Bank was allowed to waive its dividend contributions of P7.82 billion to boost its capital requirements, thus bringing the national amount remitted to the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) to P40.17 billion. But even without Land Bank, P40.17 billion still represents the highest amount ever collected from state-owned and controlled firms since the GOCC Dividends Law was implemented 24 years ago.
“This is unprecedented,” said Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez. “The record amount demonstrates the effectivity of Undersecretary Tionko and her team in instilling fiscal discipline among the GOCCs since the Duterte administration took over in 2016.”
According to the DOF-CAG, the dividends totaling P40,178,634,651.87 remitted by GOCCs in 2018 represent a 32 percent jump from the P30.46 billion collected in the previous year.
Covering the period from July 2016 to December 2018, the total cash dividend collections under the Duterte administration now amounts to P70.9 billion, the DOF-CAG said.
A total of 55 GOCCs remitted to the National Treasury as of December 14, 2018. The cash dividend collections from GOCCs in 2018 comprised 15.72 percent of the emerging total non-tax revenues of the government.
The PDIC has emerged as this year’s top dividend contributor with a total of P8.844 billion, the DOF-CAG said in its report to the Finance chief.
Among the other top dividend contributors were the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) with P6.224 billion; Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) with P3.637 billion; Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) with P3.103 billion; Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (PAGCOR) with P2.593 billion; Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) with P2.535 billion; Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) with P2.251 billion; and the National Power Corporation (NPC) with P1.410 billion.
GOCC dividend contributors for 2018 also included the Alabang Sto. Tomas Development, Inc. (ASTDI), APO Production Unit, Inc. (APUI), Authority of the Freeport Area of Bataan (AFAB), Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA), Batangas Land Company, Inc. (BLCI), BCDA Management Holdings Inc. (BMHI), Cebu Port Authority (CPA), Clark Development Corporation (CDC), DBP Data Center Inc. (DCI), DBP Leasing Corp. (DBP-LC), Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), Food Terminal Inc (FTI), GY Real Estate Inc. (GYRIE), Home Guaranty Corporation (HGC), Kamayan Realty Corporation (KRC), Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA), LBP Insurance Brokerage Inc. (LIBI), LBP Leasing and Finance Corporation (LBP-LC), LBP Resources and Development Corp. (LBRDC), Local Water Utilities Administration (LWUA), Mactan Cebu International Airport Authority (MCIAA), Masaganang Sakahan Inc. (MSI), Metropolitan Waterworks & Sewerage System (MWSS), National Dairy Authority (NDA), National Development Company (NDC), National Electrification Administration (NEA), National Home Mortgage Finance Corporation (NHMFC), National Housing Authority (NHA), NDC – Philippine Infrastructure Corporation (NDC-PIC), Partido Development Administration (PDA), Philippine Crop Insurance Corporation (PCIC), Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA), Philippine Fisheries Development Authority (PFDA), Philippine International Trading Corporation (PITC), Philippine National Oil Company (PNOC), Philippine Postal Corporation (PPC), Philippine Reclamation Authority(PrecA), Philippine Retirement Authority (PRetA), Philippine Sugar Corporation (Philsucor), PHIVIDEC Industrial Authority (PIA), Pinagkaisa Realty Corporation (PRC), Poro Point Management Corporation (PPMC), PNOC Exploration Corporation (PNOC-EC), Small Business Guarantee Finance Corporation (SBFC), Social Housing Finance Corp. (SHFC), Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA), and the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA).
Dominguez earlier attributed the significantly higher dividend remittances this year to the efficient monitoring of GOCCs by the DOF-CAG as well as by finance officials sitting on the boards of these state-run firms.
According to Dominguez, the Department of Transportation (DOTr) under the leadership of Secretary Arthur Tugade also helped ensure that GOCCs under the administrative supervision of the DOTr remitted their dividends to the BTr.
GOCCs are required to declare and remit at least half of their income as dividends to the national government, under Republic Act No. 7656.
Dividends remitted by GOCCs have steadily increased under the Duterte administration.
In 2017, dividends remitted by GOCCs to the National Treasury represented a 9.8 percent increase from the 2016 collections of P27.73 billion.
The 2017 dividend collections from 54 GOCCs exceeded the P27.73 billion remittances in 2016 even if the LandBank’s P6 billion remittance in 2017 was not included to allow the institution to recapitalize and better serve the increasing development needs of the country.
Had LandBank’s dividends been included, the total GOCC remittances would have reached P36.46 billion in 2017.
GOCCs with at least P1.0 billion dividend remittances in 2017 were PDIC with P7.461 billion, CAAP with P5.394 billion, DBP with P2.516 billion, MIAA with P2.227 billion, PPA with P1.956 billion, BSP with P1.843 billion, NPC with P1.399 billion, and PAGCOR with P1.183 billion.
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