Did Camacho quit in disgust over lack of Palace support?

Despite his official pronouncements, Finance Secretary Jose Isidro Camacho’s resignation could have been precipitated by his frustration over the lack of Malacañang support on his drive to clean up the government’s revenue-generating agencies.

Camacho announced on Friday he would leave government service by the end of this month, citing physical, emotional and financial exhaustion.

Still, rumors persisted that his resignation was triggered by a disagreement over the anti-graft program of the government, although Camacho himself denied this.

"That’s not true," he said. "There is no single cause for frustration. In government, there are always frustrations, I cannot single anything out as a triggering factor for my decision to resign."

In fact, he said Malacañang would soon issue an executive order intended to ferret out corruption, at least in the agencies under the Department of Finance (DOF).

Camacho expressed optimism that President Arroyo would issue the pending EO that would create the so-called Revenue Integrity Protection Service (RIPS).

The RIPS, one of Camacho’s brainchild, was initiated with the help of DOF Assistant Secretary Noel Bonoan, who was later appointed to head the preparatory work, including the initial conduct of a lifestyle check on officers and employees of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR).

The President was supposed to have issued the EO months ago but until now, the proposed creation of the RIPS has not been followed through.

The delay in the issuance of the EO and the creation of the RIPS fueled speculations that Camacho’s resignation was partly caused by his frustration over the lack of executive support for his effort to clean up the revenue-generating agencies of government.

The DOF had already planned to tap foreign funds to supplement the initial P10-million allocation for RIPS in an effort to institutionalize its effort to weed out corruption in its two major revenue-generating agencies – the BIR and the Bureau of Customs.

The RIPS was intended as the DOF’s internal affairs group, an ad hoc body reporting directly to Camacho. The group would have been composed mainly of Camacho’s trusted officers within the DOF, including former personnel of the defunct Economic Intelligence and Investigation Bureau (EIIB), previously an attached agency of the finance department.

Camacho explained, however, that the mandate of the RIPS would be narrower than that of the EIIB, which was disbanded during the Estrada administration. Its primary job was to clean out the BIR and the BOC.

Despite the apparent lack of executive enthusiasm for the RIPS, however, Camacho denied that their efforts have been stalled.

"We talked about the EO," Camacho said, referring to his last meeting with the President. "In fact she inquired about it and I am confident that it will be issued soon."