The Commission on Audit is not one of President Rodrigo Duterte’s favorite government bodies. In September, he uttered something about wanting to push government auditors down the stairs. In January, he said he wanted to kidnap and torture them. He has always complained about how audit rules made it difficult for local executives to act with urgency and immediacy especially in emergency situations.
True to its mandate, the COA has brought to the public’s attention some of the most glaring irregularities in the administration—for instance the excessive spending of the Presidential Communications Operations Office during the Asean summit, and the multi-billion peso advertisement deal between the then-secretary of the Department of Tourism, Wanda Tulfo Teo, and a communications entity owned by her brothers.
More recently, the commission found that the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council supposedly diverted P5 million of funds for the rehabilitation of Marawi City to send 27 survivors of the siege to the Hajj—the annual Muslim pilgrimage in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The COA issued a Notice of Disallowance to the HUDCC on February 18, instructing it to return the amount.
But speaking before the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos during the celebration of the end of Ramadan last week, Mr. Duterte said he saw nothing wrong with the fund diversion.
“I’m asking COA to reconsider. (What is) P5 million in terms of your kind generosity to finance the Muslim people?” the President said. “I would like to tell (COA) not to meddle with it.”
He warned that Mindanaoans would revolt if the COA insists on recovering the P5 million, adding that when he was mayor, he also funded Hajj activities of his constituents.
Nobody questions that such a religious pilgrimage is a crucial part of healing for those displaced by the Marawi siege. It’s an act that Filipino Muslims observe and the rest of the population respects and appreciates. But it is a stretch for the President to equate funding a trip to Mecca from funds earmarked for an equally important task, to “investing in peace.”
Mr. Duterte remains popular and credible because he has embraced peace and order and law enforcement as a hallmark of his administration. Part of ensuring order is abiding by laws that govern how government must be run. In appealing to the COA to disregard its findings—at the very least we can say he has toned down the vitriol perhaps realizing that the COA is a constitutional commission and thus independent of any branch of government—the President is sending mixed signals. Laws exist, but sometimes it is all right to break them? Rules are there for a purpose, and encouraging leniency in the application of some sets a dangerous precedent. Who is to say what a worthy exception would be? What would stop succeeding leaders from saying that the auditors should look the other way for a similar act of “kind generosity?”
Appeals for flexibility merely weaken the administration’s message on upholding the rule of law.