A complainant in a graft case filed against DPWH District Engineer Gilbert Olfindo in Camarines Sur showed me last week a copy of his plaintive letter to the Honorable Ombudsman Merciditas Gutierrez pleading “for the tenth time” to direct the release of the much-delayed findings on the investigation of the case. The letter said the Ombudsman investigator assigned to the case had concluded the investigation in May 2006 but up to now, 15 months after winding up there is nothing but a mysterious riot of silence.
He emphasized that under an existing Ombudsman administrative order and the Civil Service law the investigator has only 30 days to submit his fi ndings. More than 450 days have elapsed since the supposed deadline.
What is more appalling is that the complainant had not received at all any response for his repeated appeals to be apprised of the findings of the Ombudsman investigator. It was definitely not a diffi cult task, the complainant pointed out, because the Commission on Audit already had its own findings on the same case confirming that a violation of the Anti-Graft and Corruption Practices Act had been committed.
“I am now an old man”, the complainant who is about 70 years old lamented. “It is my wish that before I retire to infinite darkness I would be able to see the fruit of my toils to help our graft-ridden government cure itself of the malignant disease.”
The letter also cited other factors that aggravate the agonizingly slow process of resolving graft cases.
“I am in complete accord with you”, the complainant also said in his letter to Honorable Gutierrez, “when you urged the Integrated Bar of the Philippines to look into reports that some IBP members are involved in corruption in the judiciary. It is also true that Court sheriffs and PNP subpoena servers are involved in corruption in our judicial system by not promptly serving official orders incurred by your Honorable office.”
To be sure, the complainant had nothing personal at stake in the graft case he had filed. He was only certain that a glaring case of graft and corruption was committed and he felt it was his duty to do his part as citizen of this country to help President Arroyo minimize if not eradicate corruption. He believed the much publicized anti-graft drive of the President can only succeed if every citizen vigorously and unwaveringly performs his part to ferret out the culprits in many notorious branches of the government, including some LGUs.
Every citizen who has the courage to file formal complaints for graft is exposed to great risks, most grafters used to flouting the law being normally also prone to violence. Moreover, the duty-conscious citizen has to spend money and devote considerable time and effort. How could then the Ombudsman be callous to these realities?
Strange and paradoxical but in a country like ours where institutions have been set up to just go after grafters cases of corruption have only multiplied. Aside from the regular government prosecution offices, the Ombudsman, the Presidential Anti-Graft Commission and the Sandiganbayan have been also established, not to mention the Presidential Commission on Good Government. No other country on earth has as many agencies supposedly going after grafters that may actually be even duplicating functions. But despite all these multiple safeguards the Philippines has only earned the notorious reputation of being among the most corrupt countries in the world, shenanigans being rampant in most branches of the government with the DPWH on top of the heap according to a survey of the Social Weather Station.
How true is the pervading public perception that defendants in graft cases could easily buy their way out of the crimes they have committed against the people? They could in fact just be mocking the President.
Indeed, for the crusade against corruption to succeed the President must cleanse first our judicial system and weed out the undesirables. As we see it the pathetic complainant in the graft case against the Camarines Sur district engineer would have to wait for an eternity, if indeed his repeated appeals had not even been answered at all. Long after he had already “retired to infinite darkness” he could only see the cobwebs of deliberate neglect if not wanton collusion of some people in the judicial system with grafters.
