After the GOCCs exposés, then what?

No wonder, water problems continue.

Those in charge of water at the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) have chosen to use the funds of their offices for themselves rather than for continuing quality public service. Imagine, even their drivers were allowed to avail of car loans when most of the Filipinos could not even have clean and assured running water for their daily needs.

With the new dispensation, the investigation of GOCCs has unraveled the muck and abuses resulting from greed and self-interest. How could the GOCCs have allowed themselves and their offices, from top to bottom, to abuse people’s funds and use the money instead for their own annual perks?

Think of all the lowly-paid government and private employees, toiling day in and day out, with a large percentage of their low salary,deducted, as mandated by law, purportedly as forced savings for their retirement. With millions of such employees, GOCCs assigned to take care of their social insurance and social security benefits were entrusted to manage the employees’ funds.

Rather than manage the funds for the employees, however, the likes of GSIS and SSS, and other GOCCs as well, decided to use the people’s funds to give themselves bonuses, huge salaries, and other perks that recent investigations are now publicly unraveling.

It has been a long kept but well-know secret that GOCCs have been giving themselves hefty rewards at the expense of taxpayers’ funds. We understand why the abuses of GOCCs could not be revealed earlier in a corruption-plagued previous administration as corruption and abuse became the norm and moral value upheld in the past.

With a new dispensation, the long-kept secret of GOCCs is now slowly but surely being exposed. This is a welcome development but the Filipino people are asking, beyond the GOCC exposés, what?

What will happen to public funds misused and abused by GOCC officials and employees? Will they be mandated by law to return the public funds? Will they be prosecuted for abuse and misuse of public funds?

It is not enough that GOCCs are abolished or their salaries pegged at a certain level from here on. What about their past abuses? How many children were deprived of their schooling because their parents were refused their loans by inefficient GOCC systems? How many could not have funds for sick family members or even pension for their elderly because their funds have been abused and misused by officials and staff who were busy diverting the public funds for their own huge salaries and perks?

Justice, justice, justice is what people will expect from the new dispensation.

 Punish the abusive, from top to bottom. Ask them to return public funds as well, and fire, blacklist but remove the abusive employees and officials please from any other public offices. Let us also demand that the new set of officials and staff of renewed GOCCs manage the funds efficiently for the welfare of the taxpayers and provide effective, friendly public service to the real owners of their GOCC funds.

With the increasing huge income from the mandated salary deductions of all private and public employees, every year should see increase in pension amount and other perks for the members. Instead, lo and behold, only the officials and rank and file of the GOCCs rewarded themselves with the perks and privileges!

Such abusive, corrupted practice should not just be simply dismissed. Justice for all should be the guiding principle for all investigations being made now under the new Aquino government.

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