Bishops want more anti-corruption action from Arroyo
abs-cbnnews.com | 03/07/2008 5:44 PM
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By ARIES RUFO
President Arroyo vowed to address the concerns raised by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines but the bishops are adopting a wait and see attitude if she will keep her word.
One of the bishops present in the recent meeting with the President told abs-cbnNews.com/Newsbreak that Arroyo assured them she will “positively respond” to the recommendations of the CBCP and that first in the agenda was the revocation of Executive Order 464.
Arroyo junked E0 464, effectively letting her Cabinet members appear in Congressional hearings. However, her officials can still claim executive privilege on sensitive issues.
In a pastoral statement issued last week, the CBCP came up with six recommendations to address “questions about the moral ascendancy” besieging her government.
Aside from the abolition of EO 464, the bishops also urged the President to take the lead in combating corruption and to allow her subordinates to reveal any corrupt acts, particularly about the NBN-ZTE deal, without any obstruction.
The bishops also appealed to the Senate and the Ombudsman “to use powers of inquiry for the common good” and called on the media to engage in reporting without bias or partiality.
Not completely satisfied
The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity as the meeting was supposed to be “secret,” said the President “vowed that she would attend to the issues raised by the CBCP” except the last two which it is addressed to the Senate, the Ombudsman and the media. The meeting was held in a hotel.
“She said there are things she could do within her powers and one of which is the lifting of EO 464,” the bishop said. The source said the bishops were pleased with the President’s response, “but not completely satisfied.”
For one, the bishop said it remains to be seen if Arroyo will be true to her word that she will allow full scale investigations of other alleged anomalies aside from the controversial $329 million broadband contract.
The bishops will again meet in July this year to assess how the President has complied with the recommendations. “I do not know how things will shape up in July. That depends on how the President addressed our pastoral statement.”
It was not clear why the meeting involved only a select group of bishops. The source said members of the CBCP permanent council, which acts as representatives of the CBCP when they are not in session, were not around.
Only select bishops
We know the identities of the five bishops who were present in the meeting---two are from Luzon, one in Visayas and two in Mindanao—but we are withholding their names as requested by one source. An official of the CBCP’s National Secretariat for Social Action close to the Palace accompanied the bishops.
The bishops present were not necessarily anti-GMA, our source said. Many of them are neutral.
In the meeting, one of the bishops asked the President to increase the number of investigators and prosecutors of the Ombudsman to boost anti-corruption efforts. Although the Ombudsman has taken efforts to enhance its efforts by increasing its manpower, the bishop noted that the anti-graft body still lacks investigators and prosecutors.
Specifically, the bishop asked that the Ombudsman hire 500 investigators and 400 prosecutors. The President reportedly replied favorably.
