Stop the Plunder of the Nation’s Coffers! Abolish the Pork Barrel System!
August 26, 2013
The pork barrel system has to go. The Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) calls for the abolition of all forms of congressional and presidential pork barrel, including discretionary funds. Billions of pesos have already gone to ghost projects, crooked politicians, including questionable and fake NGOs, at the expense of the people, especially historically marginalised and neglected sectors like indigenous peoples. We demand for the funds to be urgently rechanneled to basic social and public services such as health, education and housing.
In the 2014 national budget, congressional and presidential pork have even increased, with consistent defense from PNoy himself, and PDAF scam notwithstanding. PNoy’s attempts to replace the PDAF system and replacing it with a ‘reformed’ system merely sought to pacify the snowballing rage of the people. As expected, PNoy did not move to abolish the presidential pork, much larage than the PDAF by at least P450 billion. PNoy’s actions and statements have proven further the fallacy and deception of his ‘daang matuwid.’ He has taken an inutile position on this issue.
For so many years, Cordillera congressmen have been receiving millions in their PDAF. But the broad masses of Cordillera indigenous peoples have yet to taste or see the development that is due to them, without our ancestral lands being plundered by big foreign and local businesses that also violate our self determination.
The pork barrel system clearly represents the very corrupt system of patronage politics. It even remains to be seen if Napoles and all others involved in the PDAF scam will actually be probed, tried, and aptly prosecuted. In fact, the investigation must incude all officials involved up to the present Aquino government. Hence, we must remain vigilant, as demand for the accountability of all responsible for the plunder and exploitation. **