The Ombudsman

WHO’S afraid of the Ombudsman? Many public officials perhaps still are not, but they should be. And so should businessmen and private individuals who conspire with officials of local government units to defraud their governments.

Over the past months, the office of the ombudsman has been indicting public officials, including private individuals, for various offenses like nobody’s business. Consider its recent record:

A former mayor and municipal accountant of Cortes, Surigao del Sur now faces a criminal charge before the Sandiganbayan for constructing a piggery building on private land using public funds; a former mayor of Marawi City, Lanao del Sur and six private individuals implicated in the anomalous expenditure of public funds intended for the Farm Inputs and Farm Implements Program of the Department of Agriculture have been indicted.

If one thinks that filing a case with the ombudsman would at least take two years before it gets any attention, think again. The Ombudsman quickly found substantial evidence to hold top officials of the Optical Media Board administratively liable for Neglect of Duty in connection with the post-raid operations conducted against a private company.

The ombudsman’s track record in securing the conviction of those it indicted is becoming palpable as well. Recently the Sandiganbayan convicted the acting accountant of Cotabato City State Polytechnic College for failing to remit GSIS contributions for six years. It also convicted Sarangani a provincial board member and a former assistant provincial veterinarian for conspiring in the misappropriation of funds. And yes, it secured the conviction of a Revenue Officer from the Bureau of Internal Revenue for false misrepresentation in her Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth.

 

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Police profile

WE now have a population of close to 100 million.  And our total police force?  Only about 150,000 or so, according to police data.  Do not be surprised by that but be surprised by this:  Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas, who is President Aquino’s de facto national police chief, says: “99 percent of our police force is good.”  He said that amid a public outcry in the wake of cops being allegedly involved, again, in a heinous crime. Only last week, 9 Manila cops – 8 of them in active duty – were charged with kidnapping two men reportedly carrying P2 million on Edsa Mandaluyong.  A netizen’s photo of the incident that went viral on the internet had led to the arrest of most of the 9 cop-suspects. Thus, Roxas publicly extolling cops straight-faced rubbed salt to injury.  And look, by simple arithmetic, Roxas is saying there are 1,500 bad eggs on the police force today.  That’s one percent of 150,000 but then, isn’t 1,500 scalawags still sends a chill down the spines?  And, are 148,500 good cops really enough as a force “to protect and to serve” 100 million Filipinos?  That’s only one cop guarding every 1,010,101 Filipinos a day.

The police picture has been that bleak.  It still is.

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