Where to Begin in a Circus of a Loop?
Let's all wrap our head around this very Pinoy matter, altogether now. Janet Napoles is Filipino-Chinese, the central character to this most recent political drama back home. Napoles allegedly put up several Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) that fronted development projects for the poor sectors of the Philippines, received billions of funds in total from Filipino lawmakers - Senators and Congressmen, which turned out to be bogus. The anomaly was brought into public knowledge through whistleblower Benhur Luy, Napoles' cousin and former employee. All sorts of allegations have surfaced in social media, a couple of whistleblowers followed Luy's lead, and the whole surrealism fueled by the luxurious lifestyle of Janet Napoles' daughter Jean Napoles as posted on her now defunct blog. And just last week, Janet Napoles surrendered to the police and her mugshot photos (seen below) are all over the net. Oh the circus that is us, Pilipinas.Oh Janet, We Are But Your Fools!
To put things in context, Philippine Senators and Congressmen receive an annual national budget allotment for PDAF or Priority Development Assistance Funds or Pork Barrel for short. Would you believe they approve their own budget since they are essentially the ones authorized to approve the National Budget of the Philippines? That's not the main catch, the plot only thickens!The money alloted for the lawmakers' PDAF can only be released by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) through a development project. And this is where Janet Napoles and her NGOs allegedly come in. The Senators and Congressmen who identified the allegedly bogus NGOs formed by Napoles as a "beneficiary" of their PDAF, requested the release of their PDAF funds to Napoles' NGOs. The DBM approved the amount and transferred the money to Napoles' NGOs and the paper trail shows that funds have been indeed transferred. However, allegedly, instead of the funds going to the projects for the poor as originally requested for by the lawmakers, the funds were being split between them and Napoles. Yes, you're reading this right!
Here's another sum-up, this time to assure myself my mind is not playing stupid tricks on me. So allegedly, the PDAF funds go to the bogus NGOs through bogus development projects, and Napoles gives a percentage of the collected money back to each of the Senators and Congressmen who provide fund to her bogus NGOs. A very simple scheme, isn't it? A mindless scam that involves billions of pesos in public funds. How we make it so damn easy to steal for these few!
One particular Senator, Jinggoy Estrada, was asked to comment about the issue since he was reported to have transferred 50 million pesos to one of Janet Napoles' NGOs. His comment? It is not the duty of the Senators to identify if an NGO is bogus or not. That's it! But to his defense, Jinggoy Estrada is the son of former Philippine President Joseph Estrada, who was ousted from the presidency due to corruption allegations, and then found guilty of plunder by the court, and who was recently elected as Mayor of Manila, the country's capital.
Grab some water to drink if you must to get through to this final stage of disbelief. The Commission on Audit (COA) in a random check went to the physical address of one of Napoles' NGO and it turned out to be a garage. A garage! Oh la la. Welcome to the Philippines. We are not one of the most corrupt countries in the world for nothing. And what do we do? Clue: la la la la la.
