It’s been three months since the P1.7-trillion flood works scandal erupted. Ninety-seven percent of Filipinos know they were cheated. Beyond retribution, they want reforms.
Only four confess to multibillion-peso plunder: ex-DPWH Usec Roberto Bernardo, Bulacan district engineers Henry Alcantara and Brice Hernandez and their moneybag-contractor Sally Santos.
Four present and two past senators are linked to kickbacks. Same with 19 congressmen. Also, the Executive Secretary, two ex-DPWH secretaries and two undersecretaries. Plus, a COA associate commissioner.
Records expose President Bongbong Marcos and VP Sara Duterte accepting illegal campaign contributions from contractors in 2022.
Such exposés would cause resignations in Japan, Korea, Australia. Not here. Philippine officials just feign innocence and stay in power. Sixty-seven lawmaker-contractors are keeping mum.
The House televised inquiry was stopped.
Senate Blue Ribbon committee head Ping Lacson resigned in disgust. He had uncovered documents showing that most senators of the immediate past Congress were involved. At once, majority members groused. The minority, meanwhile, resists review of flood scams during Rody Duterte’s presidency.
BBM’s Independent Commission for Infrastructure is left to investigate.
ICI is inutile, by design of BBM and ES Lucas Bersamin. BBM refused to certify as urgent the bill of Senate President Tito Sotto and Reps. Chel Diokno and Leila de Lima for a powerful Independent People’s Commission. Certification would’ve shortened the enactment process. Unlike ICI, IPC will have funds, full-time staff and authority to subpoena, cite for contempt and detain.
Suspects in the flood scam proved ICI’s impotence. Bernardo thrice snubbed summonses, claiming illness without any medical report.
Uncooperative, contractors Curlee and Sarah Discaya accused of bias one of the three commissioners. Upon hint of a senator, with whose wife’s firm the Discaya projects are insured, they demand state witness status without restitution.
In the end, ICI will submit findings to the ombudsman and Dept. of Justice. The ombudsman will review cases against high officials, the DOJ against lower public employees.
ICI is in effect a filter. Will it spare members of the BBM admin? That will be reminiscent of the 2013 Napoles scandal. Pork barrel fixer Janet Lim Napoles had named 20 senators and 100 congressmen. Only she is in prison today.
Congress promises change. Yet last week the House approved Public Works items for various districts but with exactly the same amounts. Obvious pork barrels. It also passed P243-billion Unprogrammed Appropriations, mostly ‘ayuda’ for sickly indigents and disaster victims. Obvious political patronage.
Filipinos are seething. Since the Sep. 21 Trillion-Peso March, 216 protesters have been arrested, zero politicos. Massive nationwide demonstrations are set on Nov. 30, Bonifacio Day.
Yet an ICI special adviser, an ex-PNP chief with a 990-kilo shabu scandal to live down, scorns mass actions as ‘division, chaos, violence.’
Trolls swarmed my Facebook column, ‘Opacity caused flood scams, so ICI probe must be public,’ Oct. 17th.
Only one sentence agitated them, ‘COA kept silent as Associate Commissioner Mario Lipana’s wife wangled DPWH road lighting contracts in Bulacan and a mining concession in Pangasinan.’ The trolls praised Lipana’s ‘leadership style’ and ‘credibility.’
The ombudsman is presently investigating Lipana. He was dragged into the flood works scandal when his contractor-wife ran but lost as party-list rep last May. The Constitution forbids COA officials from having interest, directly or indirectly, in government contracts. DPWH usec Roberto Bernardo named him under oath.
I reported to FB the coordinated inauthentic behavior that flouts its policies:
Most of the troll accounts were created only recently: June 4, July 20 and 22, Aug. 19, Sep. 18;
The oldest accounts, likely the troll managers, were created Feb. 2 and June 5, 2024;
There are three pairs of ‘friends,’ one pair shares the same posts;
Three accounts only have the same one friend;
Another three accounts have the same mutual friend;
All have no older profile photos, implying alias accounts;
All have no messages to or photos of family and friends, not even ‘like’ or ‘laugh’ reactions, meaning no normal social-media life;
They came in four waves on Oct. 21: four at 2:33-2:43 p.m., five at 3:04-3:21 p.m., three at 3:52-4:01 p.m. and two at 6:56-6:58 p.m.
One operator can handle five fake accounts for P30,000-P80,000 a month.
The cost of this trolling on just one Facebook column will likely be charged to us taxpayers.