PRESIDENT Duterte showed his political will when he fired Interior and Local Government Secretary Ismael Sueno, who implemented an anomalous deal in the purchase of firetrucks. The agreement was entered into by the BS Aquino administration.
Santa Banana, Sueno and his family even went to Austria to inspect the firetrucks—all expenses paid!
The President gave meaning to his pronouncement that he would not hesitate to fire any of his own appointees if he observed a whiff of corruption in them.
He did it with his two fraternity brothers from the Bureau of Immigration. They were caught on closed-circuit television cameras receiving money from a middleman supposedly sent by gambling lord Jack Lam.
He also dismissed Peter Laviña who was his spokesman during the presidential campaign. Laviña, who was eventually appointed to the National Irrigation Administration, was also involved in a corruption scandal.
We cheered these moves by the President.
I wonder, however, why Mr. Duterte remains to be soft on Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary-designate Regina Lopez when there is a clear instance of graft and corruption committed.
She is still a designate because the Commission on Appointments bypassed her and until the President reappoints her, she will continue to be a designate.
Lopez has been charged before the Office of the Ombudsman for her intervention, as DENR secretary, with the Department of Energy in favor of her French friend’s company based in Zamboanga. Did she really accept gifts from this private company in exchange for the favor of securing the approval of a multi-million peso contract?
The charge is that Lopez received an all-expense paid trip for her and her entourage to Paris amounting to 38,360 euros (P2.05 million) in exchange for her influence as DENR secretary to speed up the approval of the French friend’s solar farm project in Zamboanga.
No less than an official of the French company, who made all the arrangements and bookings for Lopez and her entourage, made the charge.
Indeed the President has no reason to reappoint Lopez to the DENR.
Mister President, prove to us that there’s no selective justice in your war against corruption, and nobody is above the law.
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There’s this P50.2-billion prison facility project vital to the government’s anti-illegal drugs campaign. There seems to be no report on how it is going, however.
The latest we heard was that the final bidding for the project would be held during the first week of April.
Three bidders have reportedly qualified for the bidding “•San Miguel Holdings Corp., Mega Structure Consortium, led by Megawide Construction Corp., and DMCI Holdings Inc.
The facility is to be built inside Fort Ramon Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija, and it is supposed to be the first huge undertaking by the Justice Department under the Public-Private Partnership.
The project is envisioned to replace the congested 551-hectare New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa and the Correctional Institute for Women in Mandaluyong City.
Currently, there are more than 23,000 inmates detained in the NBP, a facility designed for only 8,400 inmates.
The new prisons facility project is in line with Executive Order no. 68 issued on Sept. 8, 2006 by then President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo instructing the Department of Justice to implement the transfer of the NBP.
A milestone of the modernization program was reached on May 24, 2013 when the Bureau of Corrections Modernization Law was signed by then President BS Aquino.
The act calls on the state to “provide for the modernization, professionalization and restructuring of the Bureau of Corrections by upgrading the facilities, increasing the number of its personnel, upgrading the level of qualifications of their personnel and standardizing their basic pay, retirement and other benefits.”
The project will be implemented pursuant to the “Build-Operate-Transfer” law under the government’s PPP Program. And under the scheme of BTM (Build-Transfer-Maintain), the project proponent finances and constructs the prison facility and subsequently maintains it for 20 years.
The project provides for a three-year construction period to be followed by a 20-year maintenance period.
The winning bidder will also be in charge of provisions for staff housing, prison rehabilitation and high-tech security equipment.
The project is considered vital to President Duterte’s war on illegal drugs because of the proliferation of illegal drugs. That’s why the delay in the project has raised some concerns.
What I cannot understand is why Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II appears to take his sweet time on this.
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Frankly, I am disturbed by the decision of President Duterte to accommodate the urban poor calling themselves the Kapunan ng Damayang Mahihirap (Kadamay) in having those houses earmarked for uniformed personnel of the Armed Forces and the PNP in Pandi, Bulacan. Kadamay members occupied these houses.
That’s plain anarchy! Soon many other urban poor and squatters will believe that anarchy is now the name of the game.
I can agree that the urban poor must have housing. It’s the obligation of government. But, for the President to accommodate them so easily cannot sit well for us Filipinos who must observe the rule of law.
If uniformed members of the military and the police have not relocated to these social housing projects in Bulacan, it’s their fault. It has been said that the military and the police have been complaining that the units are too small and uncomfortable for them.
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Many Filipinos have a mistaken notion that Holy Week next week is an occasion for them to spend their days in beaches. The affluent go abroad.
Holy Week should be a time for a reflection and meditation.