FOI advocacy group urges candidates to sign waiver, show SALN

Right to Know, Right Now! (R2RKN) Coalition, a freedom of information advocacy group, on Tuesday launched a campaign urging candidates for president, vice president, and senator to make public their statement of assets, liabilities, and net worth (SALN) and sign a waiver allowing public access to other relevant documents and records.

At a virtual forum, R2RKN co-convenor Eirene Jhone Aguila said the Constitution mandates that public officers and employees must at all times be accountable to the people, serve them with utmost responsibility, integrity, loyalty, and efficiency, act with patriotism and justice, and lead modest lives.

With this, the group urged candidates to sign the following under oath and recorded live on video:

•     A waiver to allow public access to SALN or an equivalent sworn statement of net worth for those who have no SALNs as of yet.  Better yet enter into the public portal your submission
•     Irrevocable and unconditional waiver to your bank records and confidentiality release form of your medical and health records
•     For senatorial candidates, to sign the sponsorship form for the passage of the Philippine FOI (Freedom of Information) law and for those running for president commit publicly to make an unqualified declaration to push for the passage of one within your first 100 days in office.

Aguila said waivers, forms, and submission will be available on R2KRN’s website, “where we will be keeping a tracker of submissions so everyone will know who are ready to be fully transparent to the public and will not hide behind office, family, friends, allies, or technicalities to shirk from their duty to be vanguards of truth, defenders of the constitution, and true representatives of the people.”

“We challenge those who are running for office, specifically those running for highest posts—president, vice president, senator—reveal your true colors,” she said.

“What are you worth? What ties bind you? Whose family interests might you serve ahead of ours? Reveal your SALN or make public under oath a statement of assets, liabilities, and net worth,” she added.

For her part, R2KRN co-convenor Malou Mangahas said that the SALN gives the public a “baseline data” on how wealthy a public official is or how much their wealth has grown over their years in office.

“Ang mga gustong mamuno sa bayan wala dapat sikreto ukol sa kanilang yaman, kalusugan, real properties, ibang pagaari, business interests, relatives in government. Dapat bukas, tapat, mahusay, at responsable,” Mangahas said.

(Those who want to lead the country should not have secrets regarding their wealth, health, real properties, other assets, business interests, relatives in government. They should be transparent, honest, competent, and responsible.)

Aguila, likewise, said that candidates should not hide “behind custodians or overstretched claims of privacy.”

“You are after all wooing us, the sovereign Filipino people, for our votes. Sign the necessary waivers in order for us your voters to truly get to know you better,” Aguila said.

“Bantayan natin sino ang matapang, sino ang duwag, sino ang tapat, sino ang malabo at masikreto, sino ang dapat nating iboto. Kung walang tinatago, walang dapat ikatakot,” Mangahas said.

(Let us all be vigilant on who among the candidates are brave, or cowardly, who are honest, or who are secretive, who we should vote for. If they have nothing to hide, they have nothing to fear.)—AOL, GMA News