Careful scrutiny

We cannot understand why Malacañang refuses to make public its list of 116 projects funded by the Disbursement Acceleration Program. The explanation offered by Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma simply doesn’t make sense. “It is our view that the discussion of the projects is part of the active case and we observe certain rules whenever there is still an active case,” he told openly skeptical reporters. To be sure, the unanimous decision of the Supreme Court declaring the implementation of the controversial DAP unconstitutional is not yet final; the Aquino administration can still ask it to reconsider its game-changing, landscape-altering decision. Indeed, that is the context which Coloma drew to place the Palace refusal in context. “We are just saying that we are conducting a comprehensive review of the decision.”

But this is a head-scratching invocation of the sub judice rule. Would releasing the list of projects mean raising the possibility of an even more adverse ruling from the Supreme Court, if a motion for reconsideration were filed? There can be no more adverse outcome for the administration than the high court’s unanimous repudiation of the DAP. What could be worse than that? Besides, even a cursory reading of the majority decision should move administration officials to release as much information as they can about the programs, activities and projects funded by the DAP.

Here, among many such, is a crucial passage in the ponencia written by Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin: “Notwithstanding our appreciation of the DAP as a plan or strategy validly adopted by the Executive to ramp up spending to accelerate economic growth, the challenges posed by the petitioners constrain us to dissect the mechanics of the actual execution of the DAP. The management and utilization of the public wealth inevitably demands a most careful scrutiny of whether the Executive’s implementation of the DAP was consistent with the Constitution, the relevant GAAs and other existing laws.” This is a virtual invitation for the administration to be as forthcoming with the necessary details as possible, to welcome that spirit of “most careful scrutiny.” Instead, all we hear from the Palace are obvious and unconvincing rationalizations about comprehensive reviews and active cases.

In all likelihood, the administration was spooked by the sweep of the Supreme Court repudiation. Coloma’s statements, and also those of President Aquino’s spokesperson Edwin Lacierda (“It would be in the best interest of everyone to see how [senators] spent their funds if they did receive the DAP,” he said on Monday), are proof of a rattled executive branch, suddenly unsure of the next step.

We realize there is much more at stake in the DAP case than the DAP itself; some administration allies had suggested that the way the Supreme Court would rule on the DAP controversy would foreshadow its rulings on the inevitable cases that would be filed (or have already been filed) against the Aquino presidency’s most important legacy achievements, including the comprehensive peace agreement with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the Priority Development Assistance Fund plunder cases. That chattering sound we hear clear across the Pasig River, then, is the sound of nervous government officials in the early stages of an unexpected crisis.

What, in fact, is the next step? It is for the administration to heed its original mandate, and come clean. Be transparent. Respect the maturity of the millions of voters who brought it to power, and reveal as much as it can about the way it spent the DAP monies.

It is simply outrageous that the Palace seeks to put the burden of explanation on the lawmakers who signed off on their DAP allocations. In the same way that Senate President Franklin Drilon has tried to account for his P100 million in DAP funds, or Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV for his, Malacañang must also account for every single item in its list of 116 DAP-funded projects.

Indeed, it must do better. It must use its justly praised website to show every detail of every DAP project to anyone who is interested. That “most careful scrutiny” that the Supreme Court spoke of—an administration that remembers the people as “boss” would hear it, not as invitation, but as command.