“Stripped of genuine subpoena power and prosecutorial authority, the ICI was never designed to bite — only to bark”
IN THE rarefied air of corporate boardrooms, resignations are choreographed with the grace of a well-rehearsed exit interview.
Commissioner Rossana Fajardo’s farewell statement from the Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI) was precisely that: elegant, serene, and utterly divorced from the wreckage she left behind.
“I have completed the work I set out to accomplish,” she intoned, citing strengthened financial oversight, comprehensive evidence-gathering protocols, and recommendations for better procurement processes.
One could almost hear the polite applause of former colleagues at SGV & Co.
Yet outside the bubble of self-congratulation, the reality is far grimmer.
Fajardo’s departure marks the third high-profile resignation in just over three months, following former Baguio mayor Benjamin Magalong and Commissioner Rogelio Singson.
What remains of the ICI is a skeletal trio—Chairman Andres Reyes Jr., Special Adviser Rodolfo Azurin Jr., and Executive Director Brian Keith Hosaka—presiding over a body that is, for all intents and purposes, defunct before the new year.
What, one must ask, was truly accomplished?
A few referrals to the Office of the Ombudsman, an institution already groaning under its Constitutional load?
The arrest of contractor Sarah Discaya and a scattering of mid-level officials, while the masterminds of the multi-billion-peso flood control scandal remain untouched?
President Marcos’ theatrical vow that the guilty would be “jailed before Christmas” now reads like a cruel holiday joke.
Christmas has passed; the promised cells remain empty.
Fajardo’s polished exit is less a transition than a calculated retreat from a vessel taking on water.
Rats do not abandon ship because the journey is complete; they abandon it because the hull is fatally compromised.
The ICI was compromised from the moment of its birth.
As the petitioner who successfully challenged the unconstitutional Philippine Truth Commission in 2010, I recognize executive overreach when I see it.
Executive Order 94, which conjured the ICI into existence last September, is little more than a zombie rehash of that earlier monstrosity.
Created by presidential fiat without legislative appropriation or sanction, it brazenly duplicated the mandates of the Ombudsman, the Commission on Audit, and Congress itself.
Stripped of genuine subpoena power and prosecutorial authority, it was never designed to bite — only to bark.
I have long branded it the Independent Commission for Illusions, a Potemkin probe meant to simulate action while containing damage.
And the damage it was meant to contain is nothing less than a metastasizing cancer in the Department of Public Works and Highways.
Billions intended for flood control vanished into ghost projects, substandard structures, and monopolized contracts.
The intrigues surrounding the scandal are as chilling as they are revealing.
The late Undersecretary Maria Catalina Cabral, widely believed to be the repository of explosive evidence on budget insertions, plunged to her death in a ravine along Kennon Road days before she could testify.
Vice President Sara Duterte’s subsequent remark about officials suffering “ravine anxiety” captured the pervasive fear that has silenced potential witnesses.
Fugitive former lawmaker Zaldy Co remains at large; former DPWH Secretary Manuel Bonoan is conveniently abroad.
The Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, once vociferous, has fallen curiously quiet—suggesting not investigative fatigue but a political settlement.
The consequences extend far beyond political embarrassment.
Institutionally, the ICI’s collapse scatters whatever evidence it gathered into the bureaucratic maw of permanent agencies ill-equipped to sustain momentum.
Economically, the pilfered billions have contributed to sluggish growth, halted public works, investor hesitation, and a weakening peso.
Corruption here is not mere moral failing; it is direct theft from the livelihood of every Filipino. Socially, the recovery of some P20 billion in assets rings hollow without high-level convictions, teaching a cynical public that graft is simply the cost of doing government business.
This is the Marcos administration’s indictment.
Their handpicked commission has imploded on their watch.
Their deadline for justice has expired unmet.
Their narrative of transparency has curdled into farce.
Whether through lack of political will or deliberate containment to protect allies, the result is the same: impunity reaffirmed.
No more temporary illusions.
The Constitutional remedy already exists.
The Ombudsman and the Department of Justice must immediately assume full, unconditional responsibility.
They must inherit every scrap of ICI evidence—however imperfect—and publicly commit to transparent, expedited, and fearless prosecution that reaches the highest conspirators.
The public deserves an unredacted accounting of all findings transferred.
We will accept nothing less than accountability that climbs the entire chain of command, not merely the contractors and clerks.
To my fellow citizens, the media, and civil society: this is not a concluded drama.
It is an ongoing heist.
Vigilance is our only remaining weapon against a disease the ICI never treated—and may have been created to spread.
The curtain falls on 2025’s greatest political theater.
Let us ensure it is not the final act.
