The unmasking of the large-scale corruption in government is rocking the entire country. Many of us, just a few months ago, did not realize how widespread it is or the use of innovative strategies for making money from government funds, particularly those of the Department of Public Works and Highways.
We have to realize that, as citizens of this country, we have a role to play in cleansing the government of this system of corruption and the corrupt individuals who perpetrate it.
I have been writing about aspects of this corruption as they occur in this region across many issues of this community paper, especially since becoming a member of the Regional Development Council as the Private Sector Representative for Multimedia Communications from September 2022 to June 2025.
As soon as I became a member of the RDC Regional Project Monitoring Committee, I noticed that specific data from the reports of the National Economic and Development Authority showed percentages of project accomplishments.
Fortunately, the data also cited that a major project, the Tacloban Airport Development Project of the Department of Transportation, was implemented through the agency's Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines. One of the RPMC reports indicated that the airport project was approximately 30 percent behind schedule and exceeded the completion time by two years.
Representatives of the contractor, MAC Builders, confirmed the reports but stated that they will implement a Catch-up Plan. After which, the Regional Project Monitoring Committee forwarded a Resolution to the RDC, requesting that the DOTr cancel the MAC Builders contract for this project.
Curiously, the RDC Executive Committee forwarded the RPMC Resolution to the DOTr but did not explicitly adopt the RPMC's findings and recommendations. (In the future, we can dig deeper into possible reasons why this happened.)
By this RDC Excom Resolution, this body, in effect, promoted corruption: it did not adopt the Resolution but, after an hour of deliberation, acted only as a post office, forwarding it to the intended recipient, the DOTr. This act explains why the DOTr did not implement the RPMC Resolution. MAC proceeded with the project, further delaying its completion.
I conducted computations on the financial and economic impact of this delay and concluded that the region loses 5 billion pesos in tourist spending for every year of delay.
This conclusion relates to my previous column, which explained that the RDC is not a body that can fight corruption.
I also cited in RPMC meetings several efforts to make the RPMC more effective, and not only a talking committee where nothing substantial happens to remedy the problems.
I mentioned several aspects, including the possibility of repeating a pile-driving order for 100 million pesos in an area in the project where another contractor had already implemented a pile-driving project. If this really happened, that pile-driving insertion is a ghost. No pile driving actually occurred, but DOTr paid anyway.
I also suggested in the middle of 2023 that the multi-million lot acquisition be completed by the city government of Tacloban in mid-2024. The City, which agreed to do so through a Memorandum of Agreement with DOTR, was unable to do so, leaving many lots still unsettled to this day.
This lapse of time is not a matter of delayed action; more importantly, the value of the lots increased over time, and the City was unable to do its job well. The budget for this was short by over a hundred million pesos because of the delay. The national government released additional funding.
The delay cost millions of pesos in taxpayers' money.
These government activities reveal aspects of corruption. We all hope that the current thrust to unmask corruption and impose the law on corrupt public officials and their co-conspirators will produce results within a reasonable period of time, not over the next six to nine months, as announced by the Ombudsman.
This lapse of time is enough for the perpetrators to cover their tracks in many ways and to mount defenses.
I will share my views on the importance of the time element in the next issue.
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