Transparency and Accountability

By Ermin Garcia Jr.

At a recent meeting between Senator Pia Cayetano and officers of the 4Ls (Local Lady Legislators League of the Philippines) led by Dagupan City Councilor Farah Decano, the senator was visibly impressed by the latter’s piece of legislation that was adopted as Ordinance No. 1898-2007, titled – “Strengthening the Open System of Local Governance”.

It’s an ordinance that seeks to make transparency and accountability a reality in local governance.

Sure, transparency and accountability have been bruited about in many national political and media fora too often that one gets the impression that such virtues are expected only of national public officials and not from officials in the local level. Hence, hearing a local government crafting and passing an ordinance about it seemed like a novelty.

Yet in truth, reports of corruption today are perceived as a crime but only in the context of scandals particularly among national officials; little is said and reported about the individual and cumulative effects of graft and corruption in the local governments. The fact is, the biggest corrupt officials today started out as petty corrupt officials in the local government.

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That ordinance was passed in 2007 during a special session presided by then Vice Mayor Alvin Fernandez.

Now that then Vice Mayor Alvin (he who presided over that special session) has switched to the executive department as the city administrator, he now has the privilege (yes, and the honor) of making the Fernandez administration the first to give meaning to that ordinance by providing the muscle for it.

The implementation of the ordinance would be timely considering the tight financial situation that the city is in today, courtesy of the Benjie Lim administration.

The implementation we speak of is not about the mayor paying more lip service to the need for more transparency and accountability particularly among our elected officials but to diligently put the knots and bolts of the ordinance in place as defined so thoroughly in the ordinance that he helped pass.

A cursory review of the ordinance tells me that here is a template for a type of governance that political science professors to this day could only refer to these as hypothetical subjects in their lecture to their students.

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When Senator Cayetano asked Councilor Decano how the implementation has been so far, Farah replied that while the implementing rules were far from getting to first base, the city’s public officials (including her colleagues in the city council) are no longer quick to ask for additional cellphones for their personal use. They realize that they can now be readily identified and be made to account for their purchases.

That might sound petty, but it sure indicates that the ordinance can do wonders.

The ordinance’s operative tool is the adoption of e-governance, meaning making all data and pertinent information about the city’s governance accessible by posting these on a website of the city government.

The data and info will include the financial reports churned out by the city treasurer, the findings of COA, all budgets and expenditures for programs and projects status of civil applications and provision of standard forms, etc.!

It even provides for interactive activities for the public that include rating of performances of city’s officials and department heads, forwarding suggestions, and appreciating minutes of the city council meetings.

More importantly, all pre and post bidding activities for projects are posted on the website as well.

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The successful implementation of the ordinance will certainly be one legacy that the Fernandez administration can be proud of. It will be sought out by other local government units for advice on how they could implement the same in their communities, particularly how transparency and accountability helped the city become more prosperous.

But if the Fernandezes are more inclined to take their time, I won’t be surprised if Urdaneta Mayor Amadito Perez and /or Alaminos Mayor Hernani Braganza will beat them in becoming the icons for transparency and accountability in local governance.

(Readers may reach columnist at punch.sunday@gmail.com. For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/punchline/
For reactions to this column, click “Send MESSAGES, OPINIONS, COMMENTS” on default page.)

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