BAGUIO CITY – Majority of cordillera congressmen are supportive of the decision of President Rodrigo R. Duterte to create an anti-corruption task force that will go against corrupt government officials and employees in the bureaucracy with the aim of stamping out corruption in the government by the time that he will step down from power by the end of June 2022.
Benguet Caretaker Congressman and Anti-Crime and Terrorism through Community Involvement and Support (ACT-CIS) Party-list Rep. Eric Go Yap stated that the creation of the anti-corruption mega task force to be under the auspices of the justice department only shows the President’s commitment to the Filipino people to fulfill a long-standing promise to curb the deeply rooted corruption in the bureaucracy during his term that will serve as one of his legacies.
Congressman Yap said that he will also help the anti-corruption mega task force by maximizing the oversight powers of the House Committee on Appropriations to look into the spending of the different government agencies for traces of possible corruption that will warrant the conduct of further investigation to go after the culprits or those that are trying to tinker with public funds for their own personal use.
He claimed that the President had been vocal against corruption since he assumed the presidency but it seems that government workers who are involved in such illegal activities refused to reform, thus, thus the best thing to do is to use an iron hand to send a clear message to them to stop their corrupt activities or they will land in jail for the remaining years of their lives aside from losing their hard earned benefits.
On his part, Kalinga Rep. Allen Jesse C. Mangaoang bestowed his all-out support to the expected difficult work of the anti-corruption mega task force but expressed optimism that the government’s anti-corruption campaign will surely gain headway with the presence of individuals who had been tasked to perform the challenging job of ridding the government of corrupt officials.
Mangaoang had been advocating that the approach against corruption should be done from top to bottom or vice versa and that the creation of the mega task force will definitely fill up the prevailing gaps on the government’s current approach against graft and corruption.
The Kalinga lawmaker said that the campaign against corruption should be across the board because such illegal activities of various officials and employees are evident in the different agencies.
Mountain Province Maximo Y. Dalog, Jr. shared the insights of the two legislators, saying that there should be a holistic approach against corruption that will really dig into the roots of the corrupt practices which already rendered heavy losses on the part of the government.
Rep. Dalog disclosed that the President wants to prove to the country that corruption can be stopped within a given period even if he is about to end his term as what is needed from sitting officials is the political will to achieve a certain goal, especially against deeply rooted corruption activities in the bureaucracy. By HENT
