‘Let this be the moment when the Executive stops shielding and starts revealing.’
PRESIDENT Marcos Jr. should ensure that the independent probe body he is now organizing becomes truly determined and relentless in conducting a genuinely incisive probe of infrastructure projects, especially the flood control scams.
For starters, he should order that all contracts and related documents be strictly preserved by Congress and government agencies engaged in infrastructure, especially the DPWH.
He should find a way to hold the trips abroad of numerous congressmen and senators, as well as other public officials whose names have repeatedly surfaced in flood control projects, including contractors and their company officers. Processing hold-departure orders by the courts will take some time, while other suspected “culprits” are almost certainly planning to book their sudden trips overseas.
Ako-Bicol Party-List Rep. Zaldy Co, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, has left the country. Some wags are asking if this is an attempt to escape his possible civil and criminal accountability in approving the budgets of huge flood control projects.
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Dr. Tony Leachon has unleashed a mouthful at Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin’s rebuke of Congress for solons to “clean your house.”
“It is about time the Executive Branch names names. Filipinos deserve to know who among elected officials have colluded with DPWH contractors to bleed billions from flood control projects while communities drown in neglect. Let the regulatory agencies do their job. Let the DOJ wield its full authority. Let the Ombudsman and COA uncover the paper trails, prosecute the guilty, and restore public trust.
“This is not just about budget manipulation. It is about moral decay. And the only antidote is transparency, accountability, and justice.
“Let’s be honest – that house is the entire government. A house divided against itself cannot stand, as the Bible says. Abraham Lincoln also said it, and history has proved it. Today, we are watching that house crack – not from outside forces, but from within. From the termites of corruption. From the rot of moral decay.
“This is no longer about one agency or one branch. It’s about a system that has lost its soul. A government cannot protect its people if it cannot protect its integrity. We do not need more statements; we need real accountability. We do not need more blaming; we need more courage.
“Because if we do not act now, the house will not just collapse – it will bury the people beneath it. Let this be the moment we rebuild.
“President Bongbong Marcos must rise above the rhetoric. The people are suffering. They are waiting – not for more statements, but for solid results. Let this be the moment when the Executive stops shielding and starts revealing. When it starts reacting and starts leading.”
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The following is an intensely moving and despairing call for the rest of the world not to turn its back on Gaza and its miserably besieged people, especially the children.
From Aqsa Durrani, a pediatric doctor and board member of Doctors Without Borders USA with nearly 20 years of experience in humanitarian projects: “When I entered Gaza, the Israeli military had a rule: I was only allowed to bring in seven pounds of food. As I was weighing out protein bars, trying to get under the limit, I said to my husband, ‘How sinister is this? I’m a humanitarian aid worker. Why would there even be a limit on food? I’ve worked in many places with extreme hunger, but what’s so jarring in this context is how cruel it is, how deliberate!
“I was in Gaza for two months; there’s no way to describe the horror of what’s happening. And I say this as a pediatric ICU doctor who sees children die as part of my work. Among our own staff, we have doctors and nurses who are trying to treat patients while hungry, exhausted.
“They’re living in tents. Some of them have lost fifteen, twenty members of their families. In the hospital, there are kids maimed by airstrikes: missing arms, missing legs, third-degree burns. Often, there’s not enough pain medication.
“But the children are not screaming about the pain, they’re screaming: ‘I’m hungry! I’m hungry!’ I hate to only focus on the kids, because nobody should be starving. But the kids, it just haunts you in a different way. When my two months were finished, I didn’t want to leave. It’s a feeling I haven’t experienced in nearly twenty years of humanitarian assignments. But. I felt ashamed.
“Ashamed to leave my Palestinian colleagues, who were some of the most beautiful and compassionate people that I’ve ever met. I was ashamed as an American, as a human being, that we’ve been unable to stop something that is so clearly a genocide.
“I remember when our bus pulled out of the buffer zone. Out the window on one side, I could see Rafah, which was nothing but rubble. On the other side was lush, green Israel. When we exited the gate, the first thing I saw was a group of Israeli soldiers sitting at a table, eating lunch. I’ve never felt so nauseous seeing a table full of food!”
