Gov’t employees seeking protection for whistleblowers

Government employees want protection for those who blow the whistle in line with the Arroyo administration’s campaign against corruption.

Esperanza Ocampo, head of the Philippine Government Employees Association (PGEA), said government employees would rather keep mum about wrongdoings for lack of protection from reprisals.

Yesterday, the PGEA and other government labor unions signed an agreement with Executive Secretary Alberto Romulo and other Cabinet officials calling for whistleblower protection.

Last July, President Arroyo urged Congress to pass pending legislation seeking to establish a protection program for whistleblowers patterned after that of the United States.

A protection program is necessary because whistleblowers don’t want to get involved or fear retaliation, Mrs. Arroyo said. "We need to give ample protection and care to those who are concerned for our nation," she said.

The Presidential Anti-Graft Commission (PAGC) was ordered to recommend measures to protect whistleblowers.

Ironically, it was Mrs. Arroyo who demonstrated some of the risks whistleblowers take to expose wrongdoings.

In a press conference at the National Bureau of Investigation in August 2002, Mrs. Arroyo mistakenly paraded LandBank of the Philippines clerk Acsa Ramirez before the media as a suspect in a tax fraud case. Ramirez turned out to be the whistleblower.

Instead of apologizing for the embarrassing gaffe, the NBI investigated Ramirez to justify officials’ refusal to give an apology. Ramirez was eventually cleared and Mrs. Arroyo later made a public apology.

More recently, executive director Ernesto Hiansen of the Department of Finance’s One Stop Shop Tax Credit and Duty Drawback center was accused by the NBI of negligence even after the official blew the lid on a number of tax credit scams.

Various international agencies have expressed concern about massive corruption in the Philippines, which analysts say has discouraged foreign investors.

In January last year, the Arroyo administration launched an anti-corruption campaign that includes "lifestyle checks" on government officials.

Independent estimates suggest at least a fifth of the government budget is lost through graft.

One local watchdog group, Procurement Watch Inc., estimated that the Philippines loses P21 billion a year to corruption in the procurement of government goods and services alone.

Mrs. Arroyo was swept to power after her predecessor Joseph Estrada was toppled by a military-backed popular revolt in 2001 following a massive corruption scandal.

Estrada is now in jail while being tried on charges of running an illegal gambling protection racket during his aborted 31-month presidency, among other corruption charges.