‘Lame-DAP president’

Amid the brewing impeachment moves, President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III will deliver a prepared message to the Filipino nation at 6 o’clock tonight. The Palace disclosed President Aquino will make the telecast message on what he intends to do after the Supreme Court (SC) shot down as “unconstitutional” his administration’s Disbursement Acceleration Program, or DAP.

While preparing to appeal the SC ruling, P-Noy is expected to render a detailed account to show that no DAP funds went to graft. He could not wait to do this before his State of the Nation Address before Congress on July 28.

It may also be argued that this DAP fiasco is not a mere political issue. The staggering amounts that were dispensed by the Executive Department have not been properly accounted for. By comparison, the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) scandal is peanuts. The PDAF scandal involved P10 billion at most. The growing DAP scandal is close to P150 billion. That makes DAP potentially 15 times worse than the PDAF scandal.

The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has the responsibility of making sure that all funds dispensed are utilized properly. Unfortunately, DBM Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad has not been forthright how these public funds released out of DAP from 2011 to 2013 were spent.

Tagged as the mastermind of the controversial DAP, the DBM secretary tendered his letter of resignation to President Aquino last Thursday. Before convening the Cabinet meeting as televised last Friday at Malacañang, President Aquino announced he rejected the resignation offer of the DBM chief.

As far as the Chief Executive is concerned, Abad has not done any wrongful act in office that should merit his resignation. P-Noy glossed over though Abad’s being linked to the PDAF scam by businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles. 

This developed after no less than Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas, a very close friend of the Aquino family, recently issued an unsolicited advice to President Aquino that he must be “willing to let go” of people in his administration to make good of his last two years in office. Befitting its role as the “muscle” of the Church in the country, Villegas speaks for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) as its incumbent president.

Sen. Nancy Binay also echoed the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) stand that President Aquino must “let him (Abad) go.” With her father, Vice President Jejomar Binay having earlier declared his 2016 bid, the senator is merely thinking ahead how the DBM chief could turn the presidential contest in favor of the administration-backed bet.

In a press statement he issued over the weekend, Abad admitted he indeed authored the DAP. The DBM chief insisted anew that the DAP, as they conceived and implemented it, have proven to be “beneficial to the country’s economy and the administration’s bid for rapid and inclusive growth.”

As alter ego of the President, Abad must also protect P-Noy at this stage of his administration. He could have done that effectively with an irrevocable resignation. In his statement after the President did not accept his resignation, Abad made it clear he did not make it an irrevocable one.

Abad is no stranger to giving irrevocable resignations from the Cabinet. He did it, not just once but twice in fact, in the past.

The first time was when Abad served in the Cabinet of P-Noy’s late mother, former President Corazon Aquino. He briefly served as the secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform in 1990. Abad is thus very well aware about the existing Administrative Code of 1987 they could invoke as legal basis for DAP. Mrs. Aquino signed this into law while still exercising the powers of the revolutionary government prior to the ratification of the 1987 Constitution.

Abad opted to irrevocably resign from Mrs. Aquino’s Cabinet after having troubles with the Commission on Appointments. He ran again and won back his seat in the lone congressional district in Batanes. Young Noy would later join him as Tarlac congressman and they subsequently became seatmates at the Batasan.

But Abad’s second resignation was most dramatic when he and nine other fellow Cabinet members resigned en masse from the Arroyo administration over corruption issues.

They were called the “Hyatt 10” because 10 of them in the Arroyo Cabinet announced their resignation at the Hyatt Hotel in Pasay City in July 2005, exactly nine years ago.

When they took over from the Arroyo administration, President Aquino along with Abad et al. vowed to walk the “tuwid na daan.” But it must mean that P-Noy is willing to let go of his most trusted allies. Not only because the embattled DBM chief is a member of the ruling administration Liberal Party (LP), there is none more trusted by P-Noy than Abad.

As Archbishop Villegas earlier declared “a government that professes to tread the straight path must remain true to that profession.” While we agree that the principle of separation of Church and State – as guaranteed by the Constitution – must be followed, we cannot ignore the fact that a overwhelming majority of Filipinos are Catholics. We look up to Church leaders for guidance on all matters, politics included.

President Aquino – a product of the Jesuit-run Ateneo de Manila University (along with Abad) – must heed the words of the leadership of the Mother Church. Go back to the straight and narrow path, Mr. President. And get rid of the scoundrels out to make fast bucks in the remainder of your administration.

This is not to mention the fact that President Aquino is facing an early campaign mode for the presidential elections in May 2016. P-Noy could not avoid suspicions that he and his LP party mates may dip their hands into government coffers to prop up their candidate to the presidency. This anointed successor at Malacañang will protect P-Noy’s back once he loses his immunity from suit after June 30, 2016.

Now without DAP, the last 24 months before he steps down from office, or 716 days to be exact, will be doubly difficult for President Aquino. Faced with enormous commitments to deliver major projects and programs that he started, I dread to think what the Aquino administration officials would do to accomplish these tasks in the remaining days ahead.

Without extra savings they once used through DAP, there is less gravy to spread around. Pardon the pun, but P-Noy is now a “lame-DAP president.”