Environment
Secretary Ramon Paje, whose office has spent a staggering amount of
some P22 million for meals served during conferences and even ordinary
meetings and where funds were taken from projects that had suffered as a
result, was reported by the Commission on Audit (CoA), which said this
was an over expense of the DENR by 3,037 percent.
Based on the
report, four and five-course lunches are being served during conferences
worth between P550 and P600 per head. This amount is aside from snacks
served at P120 to P174 per person.
The abuses noted in the audit
report were the practice of providing breakfast even if meetings started
at 9 a.m., morning snacks and lunch were served even for conferences
that started beyond 12 noon and giving out full meals or snacks even for
“routine/ordinary meetings that last for just an hour or two.”
Moreover,
it was also found that his agency had a lot of the legislators’ pork
barrel diverted to bogus non-government organizations (NGOs).
Through
all these accusations, along with calls from his agency’s employees for
him to step down, Noynoy has cleared him, which he usually does when it
comes to his people.
Even in the face of evidence of clear abuse and
misuse of public funds, along with his office having made questionable
transactions with NGOs, Noynoy has refused to let go of him, just as he
refuses to let go of his Budget secretary, Butch Abad, and other
executives whom he has appointed, as he absolves them all from any abuse
and misuse of public funds, even in the face of evidence and admissions
from them.
Yet it is clear, in the case Paje, through his admission,
not to mention the fact that the public funds spent on ultra-expensive
food for meetings and conferences — as much as five meals everytime,
that his agency has been engaged in dealing with dubious NGOs, that
pocket the pork funds of legislators — that he and his agency can’t be
treading the so-called straight path even when they try to project
themselves as “righteous” and “clean.”
And that’s hardly just where
misuse and abuse in the agency committed can be found. The DENR as a
department, has always been known to have a lot of corrupt practices —
whether on giving environmental clearances or even in mulcting “fines”
from several big corporations and other corrupt practices.
What is it
that Noynoy’s aides — who have already been reported by a state audit
to have had anomalous practices — have on Noynoy that he has to always
absolve them, even in the face of prima facie evidence against them?
In
the case of his non-allies, however, even when the so-called evidence
is flimsy, Noynoy quickly deems them guilty, yet when it comes to his
secretaries and allies, he quickly absolves them.
Surely they must
have something on Noynoy, for him to quickly absolve his aides who stand
accused, and whom the employees of such agencies call for their
resignations, such as Paje, SSS chief Emilio de Quiros and Metropolitan
Waterworks and Sewerage System’s Gerardo Esquivel, and not to forget,
Butch Abad, who certainly has committed a lot of irregularities and
violations of the law and the Constitution. All of them have been
absolved of any irregularity by Noynoy and his Palace.
Noynoy was a
congressmen for nine years before he joined the Senate. He certainly
knew all these people and their “irregular” ways as many of them who are
now his officials, were also once congressmen and part of his gang.
Noynoy
also had his pork barrel, and it is not unlikely that his pork also
went to dubious NGOs and ghost projects, although he is being protected
by the CoA and his Budget secretary, which is why there is no CoA audit
on his pork barrel.
Maybe people like Abad, Paje and a host of other
executives under him today know too much, which could be the reason
Noynoy quickly absolves them.
