Pass the Whistle-blowers’ Act

If things come to pass, Department of Justice (DOJ) Secretary Leila de Lima will file today the first batch of plunder and other graft charges against several lawmakers and private individuals in connection with the alleged P10-billion pork barrel scam. No less than President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III announced he was assured by the DOJ Secretary that they would be ready to file the formal charges before the Office of the Ombudsman today at the latest.

Appearing at the Senate Blue Ribbon committee’s public hearing last Thursday on the pork barrel scam investigation, De Lima informed the senators that the DOJ and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) believe they would be able to meet the presidential target date. This was why De Lima requested the senators that Benhur Luy, the principal whistle-blower on the pork barrel scam, be allowed not to mention any names of senators and congressmen until formal charges were filed against them.

De Lima was beaten to the draw though when a civic group calling itself as Citizens Crime Watch (CCW) filed its own case at the Ombudsman last Friday. Named in the graft suit were five senators and 23 congressmen who were earlier among those mentioned by the Commission on Audit (COA) special audit of pork barrel fund releases from 2007 to 2009, or during the 14th Congress.

The CCW complaint was signed by its founding chairman Jose Malvar Villegas Jr. and secretary-general Carlo Batalla. In filing the case, the CCW accused the politicians named in the complaint of causing “undue injury not only to the government but to the Filipino people who had elected them and had given them mandate to serve the public by betraying the people’s trust and pocketing billions of pesos in taxpayers’ money.”

Let me say frankly though, the CCW complaint looked like more of a nuisance suit than anything else. It lacked the basic requirement of evidence: personal knowledge of the crimes alleged.

The CCW merely cited newspaper clippings on the COA report to back up its complaint against the lawmakers who were questioned for the releases of their Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) to fictitious non-government organizations (NGOs) identified with businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles. Luy tagged Napoles as the mastermind of the pork barrel scam.

Nonetheless, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales announced that her office is ready to buckle down to the nitty-gritty of these cases they expect to be filed against all the accused, whether individually or in groups. As they say, the devil is in the details.

Morales disclosed that she has formed three teams at the Office of the Ombudsman with 15 members each who would examine the voluminous data and other information gathered by the DOJ-NBI in their probe of the pork barrel scam. For starters, at least 15 truckloads reportedly of documentary evidence were gathered as a result of the exposé by Luy and several other whistle-blowers who came forward to corroborate his allegations and submitted their respective sworn affidavits.

More names are expected to come out as respondents in these plunder and graft suits to include certain heads of government implementing agencies. Last Friday, Malacañang mentioned that Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Undersecretary Mario Relampagos and three members of his staff who allegedly dealt with Napoles were also being investigated by the DOJ-NBI team.

The DBM has been notoriously known for alleged syndicates within the agency that have been making extra money out of “commissions” they get from the issuance of Special Allotment Release Order (SARO) and Notice of Cash Allocation (NCA).

Luy testified at the Senate hearing that Napoles would call the office of Relampagos to follow up on the release of the SARO and NCA from a lawmaker’s pork barrel for a certain project. A SARO is a specific authority issued by the DBM to an agency to incur obligations within its allocation during a specified period. The NCA, on the other hand, is a cash authority issued by the DBM to an office.

If there are so-called “livelihood girls” who roam the halls of Congress with offers to lawmakers of projects for their constituents using their pork barrel funds, there are “insiders” at the DBM who tip them of SARO and NCA releases available.

It is really unthinkable how Napoles has been able to ply the pork barrel scam on her own with only the help of Luy and her other employees. Through these years, Napoles has  established a network of people in and out of government to successfully get away with their illegal trade using pork barrel funds. More worms would come out of the can once these formal charges are filed in courts.

In his testimony, Luy claimed Napoles entered into agreements of sorts with the legislators. Half, or 50 percent of their PDAF releases, would go to the lawmakers. The balance of 50 percent was divided as follows: 10 percent for the implementing agencies as “SOP” (standard operating procedure), and 40 percent allegedly went to Napoles.

I can believe Luy on this score because a female friend who previously was engaged in the business of medical kits told me of her own frustrations in dealing with congressmen. In her own account, 50 percent of the total amount of the project goes to the congressman, 10 percent to the chief of staff, or if the spouse of the lawmaker gets involved in the transaction, he or she gets a cut. The lawmakers’ “contact” at the DBM also gets a tipster’s share and a separate “commission” to the implementing agency, in this case, the Department of Health.

What was left of the medical kits she would deliver would amount to only 10 percent of the total amount of the project consisting of a few paracetamol tablets and medicine for cough and colds. My friend swore she only gets 10 percent of her own earnings from the medical kit project. So my friend stopped her transactions with Congress and instead started a new business in the private sector.

It’s not worth it to make a living out of the misuse of public funds, she realized belatedly. She is no Luy who would boldly testify and unmask these powerful people involved in the plunder of public coffers.

The government must protect these whistle-blowers who risk their very own lives to expose shenanigans in public offices. The 16th Congress must prioritize the passage of the Whistle-blowers’ Act into law.