CBCP on flood control mess: Return stolen wealth

The Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) on Saturday denounced corruption in flood control projects and demanded that money that had been stolen from taxpayers be returned.

CBCP president and Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David stated in a pastoral letter that private contractors and financiers, legislators, district engineers, government auditors, and political patrons "share in the plunder."

The Executive Department and Congress are currently investigating the flood control mess. However, David questioned the credibility of the Senate and House investigations, pointing out that the "very institutions conducting them are themselves implicated."

“Who inserted these projects into the national budget as pork, often at the expense of education, health, and social programs?” he asked.

David said "true justice" entails more than just punishing those who collude in corruption.

"It also calls for restitution: that stolen wealth be returned to the public coffers from which it was taken," the Kalookan bishop said. "Many of those implicated will not be impoverished by such reparation, yet the nation remains poor if the funds are not restored."

“Retribution in this sense is not personal vengeance but the rightful act of giving back what was stolen, so that the people may finally benefit from resources meant for their welfare,” he added.

He also urged the youth to use their platforms, particularly in the digital space, "to expose injustice, share facts, [and] demand reforms."

"Make corruption shameful again," David said.

David said the people should commit to being vigilant and vocal, reject patronage politics, model honesty in daily life, build communities of truth, join civic and parish initiatives, support an independent probe, demand justice, not impunity, and lead by example in the Church.

He also asked leaders in government, business and the Church to live modestly and resist excess. 

"Let us rise above the floods of corruption together," David said. — VBL, GMA Integrated News