Tuesday, February 19, 2008 Editorial: Lest we forget the others
IN THE recent brouhaha over the aborted national broadband network (NBN) deal, forgetting corruption in sectors of government other than Malacañang is easy.
Which is understandable because the NBN deal is current and the furor has given the public a rare chance to picture the manner corruption is committed at the top levels.
Besides, critics of President Arroyo have succeeded in playing up the issue and use it as part of the continuing effort to “expose” her rule and force her resignation.
By milking the controversy, the political opposition also made itself look good, giving its presidential wannabes bigger chances against administration bets in 2010.
Cycle
The problem with this method of viewing recent developments, however, is that it perpetuates the cycle of replacing corrupt government officials with corrupt people.
In the eagerness to make People Powers I and II succeed, for example, so-called rainbow coalitions failed to consider the record in government of some of their leaders.
These questionable characters were thus able to wiggle themselves either into Malacañang or into other government branches once the new administration took over.
Then they wreak the same havoc on government like the ones they replaced did.
Other fronts
This error is being repeated in the failure of many to consider that the NBN scandal is but part of the culture of corruption that has permeated the government.
In the Senate inquiry on the controversy, for example, senators, especially those in the hunt for the presidency in 2010, gloss over corruption in the legislative branch.
One has yet to hear of congressional inquiry on how pork barrels are being spent and how much of the billions of pesos appropriated for the purpose went to kickbacks.
And how many of the important personalities in the oust Arroyo movement and who were former government officials were involved in corrupt acts in the past?
Of course, if the sole purpose in the furor over the NBN deal is to force Arroyo’s resignation, then widening our perspective on corruption in government is superfluous.
