House Deputy Speaker and Batangas 6th district Rep. Ralph Recto (Facebook)

House Deputy Speaker and Batangas 6th district Rep. Ralph Recto says the lack of "smarts"--and not funds--is the real root cause of the Land Transportation Office's (LTO) plastic driver’s license card woes.

“Not all procurement debacles stem from lack of money. Some are caused by inefficiency, by agencies rich in resources but poor in foresight,” Recto said in a statement Saturday, April 29.

To illustrate his point, the veteran solon said that the P249 million that LTO supposedly needs to print the needed 5.2 million plastic driver’s license cards is what the agency earns “in a mere three and half days".

“Hindi kakulangan ng pera ang dahilan, pero tila kakulangan sa diskarte (The problem isn't the lack of money, but apparently, the lack of smarts),” Recto said.

Recto said LTO posted revenues of P26.68 billion last year, “which comes up to P73 million a day".

“So it would only take three-and-half days of LTO collections to fund the P249 million required to purchase a year’s supply of plastic driver’s license cards,” underscored the former Senate President Pro Tempore.

At P19.32 billion, motor vehicle user’s charge and other registration fees accounted for bulk of LTO collections in 2022.

Next were license fees, which contributed P3.24 billion. Fines and penalties added P3.08 billion to its collection haul.

“Doon pa lang sa bayad sa lisensya, isang buwan lang na koleksyon sapat ng pambili ng plastic cards na lisenysa (The one-month collection for the license is enough to purchase the plastic cards),” Recto said.