Defending DILG’s Php 14 Billion DAP

by Dean de la Paz, as originally posted on Blog Watch, Philippine Online Chronicles

In the ever-worsening controversy involving the misuse of our hard-earned taxes and its wholesale and unauthorized re-channeling into fodder and feed for political patronage, it is now evident that the feeding and fattening goes well beyond the pork-barrel fed legislature and those non-existent NGOs (non-government organizations) and other ghost beneficiaries nourished by our honorable lawmakers’ whims and preferences.

Forget fiscal prudence. The government does what it pleases with our money. The usages cover the whole spectrum of political narcissism all themed under personal aggrandizement and self-indulgent ejaculations to prop political imagery in the prospect of perpetuating coveted political positions. As these scum now deliberate on the best way to distort the definition of “savings” so that they may continue to rob the public blind they constantly subscribe to an ancient Liberal Party motto.

Go ahead and change the definition of “savings” to legitimize systemic thievery. Defend yourselves. The chief executive had given the marching orders. Indeed, what are they in power for?

Whether we are here referring to the illegal Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) or it’s nepotistic kissing cousin, the also illegal albeit humongous PDAP (PNoy’s Disbursement Acceleration Program or DAP), pork is pork, and pigs are pigs. Within the national pigsty from the Babuyan at Batasan Hills, to the sewer by the sea and the piggery along the Pasig, the beneficiaries of the Palace’s patronage range from ghosts of all shades, genders, normal and badaf, as well as crooks in every nook and cranny.

Simply listen to the deafening cacophony chorused by a victimized public whose trust was brazenly betrayed and whose dearest constitution,thanks to Benigno Aquino III, now lies trashed by the very official vowed to protect it.

The public’s righteous indignation is directed towards a cross-border spectrum of some of the bureaucracy’s most despicable that now includes Aquino’s Mini Me’s, whether they be kabarilan, kaklase or ka-baro (KKK). Indeed the DAP had crossed borders in more senses than imagined by the Supreme Court. Note how opposition legislators typically drawn as villains were in a conspiracy with the ruling party as they led most of the senate in convicting a former Chief Justice.

This, after all, is the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde nature of Philippine politics. Duplicity. Everyone is a turncoat.

Let us view Harvey Twoface’s other cheek. Note how those in the ruling party were themselves some of the highest officials who lied and cheated for the previous administration – one that is now painted as villainous. Evidently, patronage, payola and pork barrels flow every which way and righteous principle matters less than does political convenience.

All-throughout government’s pork-barrel epidemic, the only constant is the victimization of the public. That is our money that they wantonly use as currency as they buy each other out and in the ever-changing polarities political propensities go invariably from right, to wrong, to right. And then back again.

Recently the Commission on Audit (COA) revealed that one Aquino-appointed official was the recipient of a Php 5 million car needed to ferry the official around town. The Php 5 million was sourced from DAP whose criteria was supposed to have included its prospective impact on gross domestic productivity (GDP) and its positive impact on poverty. In the senate hearing investigating the DAP, Senator Nancy Binay (UNA) asked how a Php 5 million car can improve GDP and eliminate poverty.

The answer was as lame as they come. The Php 5 million was a “small amount”. Its insignificance allowed it through the audit sieves.

Chameleons can change the color of their skin twice. Others, thrice. Some snakes and insects have the same ability. Some squids, likewise. One in particular stands out. The official was among a previous administration’s most trusted cabinet secretaries. Towards that administration’s premature end, like rodents on a sinking pirate ship, the official jumped ship and, like defectors, eventually parlayed a dissident persona, only thereafter to worm into Gloria Arroyo’s inner circle.

Now, the official is among Aquino’s.

These aberrant political transvestism is not as abnormal as we might think. The political path has always been crooked.

Recently, broadsheets bannered that the secretary of the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) was being questioned on the issue of DAP. He was tasked to account for over Php 3.2 billion allegedly misappropriated to the Philippine National Police. The official was also being asked to account for DAP funds re-channeled to renovate and redecorate office space as a GDP growth-enhancing expenditure.

As for totals, the DILG admitted that over Php 4.5 billion were DAP -sourced. This is in addition to another DAP-sourced Php 10 billion for housing squatters, a function, like climate-change expenditures, that is essentially within the ambit of entirely different cabinet portfolios.

Do the math. “Small amounts” add up.

We are certain that all these can be defended as GDP growth catalysts. The clamor for accountability in this specific instance is, however, immeasurably more relevant on several fronts – each demanding complete honesty, integrity and the plain vanilla truth un-embellished by publicity stunts, spins and other enhancements typically resorted to.

Because of 2016, of the recipients of the DAP billions, those that went to the DILG more than other beneficiaries compel in-depth audit and scrutiny as to its legality and impact to GDP, all arrayed against the usages originally authorized by the GAA.

The controversial DAP is an issue that will carry well into 2016, first from the stench that it attaches to its advocates, defenders, and beneficiaries should their ambition take them that far, and second, from the fact that a new government might well be in Malacanang – one that would either hopefully prosecute those Pork Barrel crooks who now hide behind Aquino’s coat-tails, or, should present political parties perpetuate, one that might simply hand out yellow Get-Out-Of-Jail cards, thus letting the patronage pigs graze scot free.

Blog Watch stock photo. Some rights reserved.