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GenSan road right of way scam
By its RROW acronym, this man-made financial mess is humongous as it is incredibly monstrous in its proportions to be believed.
And yet, by the testimonies of those who were involved in the scandal when the talkative but smarter than Sherlock Dick Gordon flushed out the harsh truth from them, the billions paid out to the authors cum recipients were the kind that would be regarded as norms of corruption in this country.
I was seated in the gallery inside the modest-sized, fully-packed SP session hall in Gen. Santos City as Sen. Manny Pacquiao brought forth the much-heralded Blue Ribbon Committee with Senate President Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel in tow (aside from its chair Richard Gordon).
The principal whistle blower Roberto Catapang stood his ground as he boldly named the identities of all those involved in the syndicate including a certain Wilma Mamburanan who was pinpointed to have received the largest bulk of the payments.
When queried by Gordon to take the witness stand, Mamburanan invoked her right to self-incrimination.
What made me almost puked was the revelation elicited by the senator from Olongapo City from at least two syndicate members that they only received two percent as their commission from a P14M plus account paid for by the regional office of the DPWH for every RROW claim.
Gordon was incensed that no one from the regional officials of the DPWH, including the accounting officials who issued the checks, noticed the uniformed sizes of the land area (8,221 sqm) in question which were billed at the same uniformed price of P14M plus.
Retired DPWH RD Reynaldo Tamayo, Sr., stammered and could not fully explain and convince Gordon about the obvious price uniformity and land sizes.
Any stupid moron (pardon the redundant terminology) just at first glance, would inevitably sneer at the crudeness of the authorship because it is very insulting to their intelligence. What irony!
Gordon will hear anew the testimonies of those involved in the anomaly come May when the Senate sessions resume in Manila.
Thereupon, he advised Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre who was present during the two-day probe, to issue a hold departure order against Mamburanan.
This is only the tip of the iceberg.
I have received information from some friends in Davao that the same modus operandi has been employed in their area. They said they were offered a ridiculously tempting overprice but the landowners would only receive 30% of the total gross price.
The audience that has overflowed at the SP session hall learned that this scheme somewhat commenced during the last several months of the GMA administration and proceeded onto the full six-year term of the Noynoy Aquino government without hardly anyone – including the mainstream media - noticing.
Actually, why and how was it only this time that the Duterte administration came about that the multi-billion RROW scam was exposed?
Did anybody in the higher echelons of government in the previous regime make a cover-up?
Because all administrations have their respective road and bridges infra building programs, this RROW scheme must already have assumed a gigantic proportion too alarming not to be earthshaking.
The Filipino people – the underprivileged and the poor millions – are helplessly mangled by the number of financial exposes (the P3.6B Dengvaxia immunization, the P10B senior citizens fund misuse, etc.) but can only stare in disbelief.
But in China, recently one corrupt Vice Mayor was sentenced to death and that should be by firing squad.
My personal conclusion is that our laws have many loopholes and that the administration of justice is exceedingly slow.
Maybe - just maybe - one conviction on corruption charges should be punished by firing squad.
Or is that too harsh? (Email your feedback to fredlumba@yahoo.com.) Prov. 11:25 says: “A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.” GOD BLESS THE PHILIPPINES!