Governance

MANILA, Philippines – Malacañang declared yesterday that all midnight appointees of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo must immediately vacate their offices pending the resolution of petitions filed against the implementation of Executive Order 2 revoking the appointments made during the prohibited period.

President Aquino said his governance will be characterized by a new paradigm. This is now evident in his work style – not wanting to have his name placed on government projects and adopting a team approach in management. We also note his careful management of limited resources such as scheduling a few foreign travels. As…

The American ambassador ex-uded his trademark ebullience. “Today’s decision by the MCC Board of Directors, chaired by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, marks a vote of confidence in the Aquino Administration and its commitment to confront corruption,” declared Ambassador Harry Thomas Jr. “The MCC grant will support President Aquino’s efforts to reduce poverty, stimulate economic…

MANILA, Philippines – To speed up issuance of business permits and licenses, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) launched on Friday a project to streamline these processes in cities and municipalities.

PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino III has fired more than 970 government officials appointed by his predecessor, saying their taking office violated a constitutional ban on new appointments during the election period that began on March 10.

A BUSINESSMAN on Wednesday asked the Ombudsman to immediately suspend three officials of the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) for alleged partiality and conflict of interest in violation of Section 13 of Republic Act 3019, otherwise known as the Antigraft and Corrupt Practices Act.

MANILA, Philippines – This has reference to the column of Mr. Jarius Bondoc (Gotcha) entitled “How the budget racket operates” which appeared in the July 30 issue of The Philippine STAR.

MANILA, Philippines – President Aquino ordered yesterday the revocation of the midnight appointments of the previous Arroyo administration.

With Executive Order (EO)1creating Truth Commission signed, the Aquino Administration can now turn to the more crucial part of his anti-corruption agenda: fighting graft under his watch. Those with illusions that running after the previous regime would stop sleaze under the current one should recall what anti-graft prosecutors have to show for their pursuit of…

Promoting leadership of excellence MANILA, Philippines—He can win an election but can he run a country?” This was the headline of a newspaper in South Africa when Nelson Mandela was elected President in 1994 after the fall of the apartheid regime.

LOW-LEVEL OFFICIALS, PRIVATE EXECS COVERED While focused on the nine-year Arroyo administration, the so-called Truth Commission created yesterday through Executive Order No. 1 will include in its broad scope public officials of at least third-level, such as department heads of government agencies and even private individuals suspected of being involved in graft and corruption cases.

MANILA, Philippines – Malacañang has again issued a revised version of Memorandum Circular 1 (MC 1), extending non-career officials holding Career Executive Service (CES) positions until October 31 of this year.

MANILA, Philippines – Thousands of government workers, from Malacañang down to the line agencies, will be joining the ranks of around three million unemployed as the Memorandum Circular 1 (MC 1) of President Aquino extending their services expires today.

Malacañang on Wednesday seemed to have retreated on its claim that the previous Arroyo administration violated the law in connection with its treatment of the national budget. Budget and Management Undersecretary Mario Relampagos said that there was nothing illegal in the immediate past government’s spending of the general appropriations in the first six months of…

MANILA, Philippines – Malacañang stood pat on the figures cited by President Aquino in his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) and maintained that the previous administration was “fiscally irresponsible” and “immoral” by going on a spending spree during the first half of the year when no revenues were coming in.

STATE subsidies to non-financial government-owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs) fell in June, the Bureau of the Treasury said on Friday. Last month, the national government only disbursed P183 million, or 90.6 percent lower than the P1.94 billion released in the same period a year ago.

THE previous administration has spent most of the 2010 budget, leaving the government only 10 percent or about P100 billion to cover expenses for the next five months, President Benigno Aquino III said Friday.

I wrote this piece in July 2004 in the hope that Gloria Macapagal Arroyo would listen and use it in her State-of-the-Nation Address. She didn’t, it can all be said again, with some amendments to bring it up to date and adapt it better to a new president. Let’s hope I won’t be able to…

MANILA, Philippines – Employees of the Bataan Economic Zone appealed yesterday to President Aquino to review the midnight appointments of the chairman and board members of the newly created Authority of the Freeport Area of Bataan (AFAB) in Mariveles town which they claimed hastily took over the freeport a day before President Aquino assumed his…

MANILA, Philippines – Interior and Local Government Secretary Jesse Robredo vowed to walk the talk on President Aquino’s “kung walang corrupt, walang mahirap” anti-corruption drive.

MANILA, Philippines – The Aquino administration has inherited a budget gap of P196.7 billion in the first six months of the year, 28.2 percent more than the P153.4-billion budget deficit recorded in the same period last year.   

MANILA, Philippines – He did it before; can he do it again? With his appointment as Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) secretary, corporate executive Jose “Ping” de Jesus has been pulled back to government service with a tough task: to perform once again the miracle of cleaning up a huge bureaucracy the way he…

Illicit list? Arroyo’s 977 ‘midnight’ appointees LAWYERS at the Palace have been burning the midnight oil scrutinizing nearly a thousand appointments made by then President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in various government agencies, including state-run corporations, from January this year until she bowed out of office on June 30.

THE COMMISSION on Information and Communications Technology (CICT) will start this month a 24-hour citizen help line as a form of public service, an official said.

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President Aquino III’s move to form a Truth Commission that will investigate Gloria M. Arroyo’s alleged wrongdoings committed in nine years of her presidency raises public expectations way above government’s ability to meet. Right now, there are courses of action that can be taken by independent groups serious with the prosecution of the discredited former…

In letters to the Supreme Court justices, the PCIJ said that because of the court’s policy against disclosure of statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN), the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) decided to do its own research into their business interests and financial connections of the justices by mining various public records.

Second of three parts Republic Act (RA) 6713, or the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees, enacted on February 20, 1989, is crystal about the inclusion of justices and judges among those who should file, and publicly disclose their statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALNs). According to the…

Career civil executive Atty. Ramon G. Cuyco was properly warned. Joining the Customs Bureau in Jan. 2003 would be jumping from the frying pan into the fire. He had faced heavy pressure before, at the finance department, in exposing a giant firm’s P1.1-billion and a leading lawyer’s P48-million false tax credits. Yet he was entering…

Interestingly, the Federal Constitutional Court of the Federal Republic of Germany ruled (on March 3, 2009) that the use of voting machines must “meet the constitutional requirements of the principle of the public nature of elections.” The principal basis for this ruling was that “all essential steps of an election… [must be] subject to the…