The Amnesty International report that the Philippines has gone 14 notches down the corruption ladder is quite unfortunate but appears to be true. It is now on the 113th place out of 180 countries. In 2011 it was way down, in 129th rank.
The putting up of the complaint center in Malacanang was a welcome development when this administration took over, but it is not making a big dent as expected. While it might be foolish to think of eradicating corruption that got engendered since we were colonized centuries ago, whatever systems institutionalized now to curb it must be looked at again and again to find better ways on how to get better results.
Being more proactive might be the key.
After a corrupt act is reported, what happens? It often just ends there. Will the government pursue with doggedness the matter by investigating it exhaustively and then file the appropriate charges in court? No it does not and will not.
Does the Ombudsman go out on his own to investigate and file charges against officials of inefficient government agencies? No, it does not. But legally, it could.
Do law enforcement agencies employ entrapment to weed out corrupt government officials? No, they don’t, unless a high ranking official’s or bureaucrat’s corrupt interest was ran into. Then the force of the law will be made to bear on the interloper.
Otherwise, “it is scratch my back and I will scratch yours.” Don’t stray into my ‘corruption turf’ and I will respect yours.
So who cares? Nobody it seems.
We don’t even have a law yet to protect, even reward, whistle blowers. They are always left on their own against moneyed corrupt officials. Thus the cases filed because of the valuable information they gave at great risk often get dismissed, and they become as good as having been hanged in public to serve as an example that in this country crime pays big.
The freedom of information order of PDuterte has yet to become a statute so it would be more entrenched in our legal system. As things are, it is just an executive order which can be readily changed by another order of the president.
And so we might keep on sliding down the corruption ladder as whatever government is doing to curb that perpetual disease of ours is insufficient.**