THE Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and the Bureau of Customs topped the list of the most corrupt departments and agencies of the government, in a report released on Thursday by the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC).
Manila on Thursday. PHOTO BY J GERALD SEGUIA
PACC Chairman Dante Jimenez delivered the “Ulat sa Bayan” (Report to the Nation) marking the first year of the commission, and its accomplishments since it started receiving complaints in March.
From March to September 2018, the PACC received 411 complaints of alleged corruption in various departments and agencies of the government, of which 59 were “verifiable” complaints.
“Verifiable complaints are complaints supported by documents whose veracity can be readily checked. The Department of Public Works and Highways had the most number of verifiable complaints received, topping the list,” Jimenez said.
DPWH vows action
Public Works Secretary Mark Villar, in a statement, vowed to take action on all the complaints, and called on the public to report to him directly through his hotline (165-02), available 24/7.
Following President Rodrigo Duterte’s mandate of increasing transparency and accountability in government, the DPWH has put in place a number of reforms, such as the Infra-Track App, which has effectively ended ghost projects in the department through the use of geotagging and drone monitoring, Villar said.
“Verification and validation of legal, technical and financial requirements is done using the Civil Works App — which eliminates the human intervention in compliance monitoring,” he said.
The DPWH has also adopted the Project and Contract Management Application or PCMA, whose centralized database allows not only “real-time” updating in the field, but also accelerated analysis and problem resolution at the project or contract level and full analytics at the construction program level.
“Now, as early as when the system detects a 5 percent negative slippage — the contractor involved in the project will be given a warning and required to submit a ‘catch-up program’ to eliminate the slippage or delay,” he said.
Villar said the shift to the new system gave the DPWH better access to information and aggressively investigate and blacklist erring contractors.
DENR, GOCCs
Joining the DPWH in the list were government-owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs), which got the second biggest number of complaints, followed by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources
(DENR) and the Department of Finance (DoF) and its attached agencies, the BIR and Customs.
Completing the list are the Department of Agriculture, Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of
Transportation the Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE), and the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples.
Jimenez explained that all reports received at the PACC came from the Office of the President.
Fact-finding inquiries involved issues over infrastructure projects and related matters in the Bicol region; incidents involving the DoLE and the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration; and issues like the rice shortage, delayed irrigation projects worth billions of pesos; questions to the Bureau of the Treasury; the questionable renewal of mining contracts; illegal logging and others.
The PACC identified some of the government officials involved in the anomalies, including former labor undersecretary Dominador Say, who was fired by the President in April in connection with an alleged P6-million extortion case
PACC Commissioner Manuelito Luna said the commission found probable cause to recommend the filing of criminal complaints against Say before the Office of the Ombudsman.
Also tagged was district engineer Roberto Nicolas of the DPWH South Engineering Office. In August, Nicolas and four other DPWH personnel were caught in a video allegedly extorting P4.1 million from a contractor.
Jimenez also pointed to the BIR and Customs as the most corrupt collection agencies of the government, with some personnel involved in embezzlement and extortion cases.
He cited as an example the case of three BIR-Makati personnel who were caught by PACC and NBI in an entrapment operation in San Juan City after extorting P600,000 from a businessman.
Some Customs officials were also allegedly coddlers of a gold-smuggling syndicate operating at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).
Three suspects were arrested last month for attempting to smuggle P6 million worth of gold jewelry at the NAIA Terminal 3.
‘Pork still exists’
The PACC also claimed that the Priority Assistance Development Fund (PDAF), popularly known as “pork barrel,” continues to exist, along with the disbursement acceleration program (DAP) of the Aquino administration. PDAF and DAP were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
Jimenez called the attention of the heads of the government departments and agencies, particularly those on the most corrupt list, to do their jobs and clean their turfs of corruption, even as he clarified that “when I call the attention of the ‘top four’ corrupt departments and agencies it does not mean that they are corrupt, but their agencies [are].”
PACC also noted that most of the anomalies, particularly in infrastructure projects, were committed during the Aquino administration.
But the present heads of departments and agencies should act and not pass the blame on their predecessors, he said.
It urged all line agencies to set the stage for bureaucratic reforms, and for heads of government agencies to be accountable, take command responsibility, and eliminate agents and middlemen in transactions.
‘Unfair to Congress’
Malacañang on Thursday urged the PACC to press charges against corrupt government officials amid the reported return of “pork barrel” system in Congress.
Palace spokesman Harry Roque Jr. made the statement after PACC spokesman Greco Belgica said the pork barrel system remained under President Duterte.
“All I know there is a decision against the pork barrel system and that if he says it persists, I hope he will file charges against individuals. That’s their mandate,” Roque told reporters in a news conference.
Roque, a former congressman before he became Duterte’s spokesman, disagreed with Belgica’s statement that Congress is the most corrupt branch of government.
“Let’s not call it the most corrupt. There is corruption, but it is not the most corrupt,” he said. “As an ex-congressman, [I think] that’s unfair.”
WITH CATHERINE S. VALENTE AND RALPH EDWIN U. VILLANUEVA