Rep. Winston “Winnie” Castelo today described the goal to eradicate completely the widespread corruption in government as possible to achieve in 2015, but said this objective would require the full mobilization of the public and private sectors to develop an anticorruption culture and the deployment of a “critical mass” of supporters to enforce the anticorruption laws.
While describing the current anticorruption campaign as a “sequel” to the 1986 EDSA Revolution and the “centrepiece program” of the Aquino administration, Castelo (Liberal Party, Quezon City) said “a different, albeit special, kind of political will be necessary to drive away from public service the corrupt elements.”
Castelo has proposed a set of initiatives to strengthen the anticorruption campaign. These include:
- increase in the budget of the Office of the Ombudsman to at least one percent of the annual national budget;
- sustained lifestyle check of public officials;
- enactment of a law protecting whistleblowers;
- empowerment of the private sector to go after corrupt public officials,
- development of a mass culture that rejects corruption as a way of life, and
- creation of an “anti-corruption army,” which would involve and represent a critical mass of ordinary citizens, who would run after corrupt public officials.
Castelo said he has based his anticorruption agenda on complete cooperation of the public and private sectors, stressing that it requires the full involvement of the private sector, which includes the Church, civil society, business community, the academe, and even the youth and young professionals, who have bigger stake in the nation’s future.
“What we need now a new social movement that would reject corruption as a way of life and usher a new mass culture that highlights integrity in public service,” Castelo said. “Anything short of a mass movement would lead to failure.”
Castelo defined corruption is the use of power for private gain. It involves public officials, who use their power to extort bribes and private persons, who bribe officials to gain advantage or secure profitable government contracts.
Corruption impedes national development, discourages investments, and negates moves to make the country as globally competitive as possible. It denies the poor the access to public services, as the government loses resources, Castelo added.
While saying that the country has become notorious for being one of the most corrupt nations in Asia, Castelo stressed it has to develop the political will to confront and tackle corruption, but warned it cannot leave the anticorruption agenda to the government alone since “it neither has the wherewithal, the political will, nor new ideas” to handle corruption.
An anticorruption agenda requires the full participation and mobilization of the government, civil society, the Church, business community, and the youth in a social movement against it, Castelo said.
“Their mobilization and participation would be crucial to reduce corruption to zero level by 2015,” he said.
Initially, the budget of the Office of the Ombudsman should be raised because its current budget of 0.7 percent or less of the national budget is insufficient, Castelo said.
“Raising it to at least one percent of the national budget would signal the serious policy shift to combat corruption,” Castelo said. “In contrast, the government loses at least 20 percent of the national budget to corruption.”
Because of its limited budget, the Office of the Ombudsman could hardly build up cases and prosecute them, as shown by its batting average of winning only 7% or less of all lawsuits it has filed in court is hardly satisfying, Castelo said.
The Office of the Ombudsman has hardly run after any other big fish, making corruption a “high yield, but low risk” activity in the country, Castelo said.
“Hence, corruption has become endemic, taking roots in the nation’s social, economic, and political fabric, Castelo said, adding that opinion polls showed that most Filipinos have learned to accept corruption as a way of life.
Castelo also called for a vigorous, sustained, and continuous lifestyle check of public officials, adding that this is easier to pursue because a glaring difference between his lifestyle and his reported statement of assets and liabilities would be enough to establish prima facie evidence of corruption.
The proposed anticorruption agenda calls for enactment of the Whistlebowers’ Protection Law, which elevates to state policy the provision of ample protection to people, who would spill the beans on public officials, who have committed – or about to commit – corrupt activities.
Embedded in government, whistleblowers possess knowledge about corrupt acts; they are in the best position to expose and make them public, Castelo said. “Hence, a whistleblowing policy becomes necessary for the detection and prosecution even of well-hidden anomalous transactions.”
Castelo said that a major reason for the government inability to prosecute corrupt public officials is the continuing failure to protect whistleblowers, who feel that the government would leave them alone when the situation becomes tough.
Castelo’s anticorruption agenda includes the fourth point, which requires the multisectoral involvement – from the nongovernment and people’s organizations that compose civil society, the business community, the Church, the academe, and even from ordinary citizens.
“The imperative is for the private sector to take the lead,” Castelo said, even as he pointed to the fiftth point, which is the development of the anticorruption culture, or the counter-consciousness that stresses the negative effects of corruption.
“The anticorruption agenda should propagate the awareness that corruption is not normal in a developing nation like ours. It has to develop the counterculture that justifies and rewards whistleblowing,” Castelo said.
Also, the fifth point should strive to the creation of an anticorruption army of private citizens, who would readily report and run after corrupt public officials and even private parties, who corrupt public officials. 30
