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Friday, March 29, 2024

On a whiff, not a whim

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One of the first things the Duterte administration did in 2018 was to fire the chief of the Maritime Industry Authority for taking too many trips abroad.

Marcial Amaro III was sacked for going out of the country 21 times in the past one year and six months, and only six of the trips were sponsored by other countries. The rest were paid for by taxpayers.

In a television interview, Amaro insisted the trips were all important to the job and his agency was supposed to deal with international organizations.

The ex-Marina chief also said all his travels, out of which arose two bilateral agreements and about 15 other deals, were all approved by the Department of Transportation.

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The President supposedly acted on a letter from the Alliance of Marina Employees that sought Amaro’s ouster, saying he was an absentee administrator, but the ex-chief said the employees told him they never sent the Palace any.

Outside of the fact that it’s a he-said-she-said dilemma, the weeding out of officials perceived to be corrupt is a good habit the administration could keep.

Mr. Duterte came into power promising change, and now, a year and a half later, the public keeps getting mixed signals on how the change is exactly coming about.

Sacking his own appointees “at the slightest whiff of corruption” is an encouraging mantra that will definitely count as change, especially when we think about how protective Mr. Duterte’s predecessor was of his own people.

We only hope that the mantra will be truly consistently applied, regardless of who the officials are and no matter how close to the Palace they could be.

We hope too that the “whiff” excuse will not be selectively used to go after the President’s foes or critics—that would make it sound too much like the hypocrisy-laden old times.

Only this consistency will earn for the administration the credibility it should enjoy.

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