EDITORIAL - All in the family

An investigation has been ordered, according to Malacañang, into reports of rampant nepotism in two agencies: the Presidential Commission on Good Government, and the Presidential Anti-Graft Commission. As the names of the agencies imply, this can be particularly embarrassing for the government’s avowed efforts to promote good governance.

The accusations, however, are hardly surprising and, in the case of the PCGG, not even new. The subject of the PCGG probe is the chairman himself, Camilo Sabio, who is no stranger to controversy. Published reports said he has hired 35 consultants and aides, including his son, daughter and two sons-in-law, and has used the agency’s $5-million travel fund, which is supposed to be used for litigation purposes, for his frequent foreign travels together with his wife. In one such trip, he allegedly gave himself an allowance of $120,000.

Over at the PAGC – that parallel agency created by the President to complement, or perhaps dispute, the work of the Office of the Ombudsman – the head has done something similar, according to reports. PAGC employees are said to be griping that their head Constancia de Guzman has hired her son, his fiancée and her sister, among others, to key posts in the commission.

Then again, why should all this be surprising? The Chief Executive herself, who at the start of her presidency refused to sign the appointment of her only daughter to the foreign service after she passed the grueling qualifying exam, has just signed a law creating a special congressional district that effectively accommodates the political plans of her youngest son.

Executive officials take their cue for their behavior from the appointing power. No one will be surprised if the purported order to investigate corruption and nepotism elsewhere in the executive branch never goes beyond press releases.