“How Diokno (Ernesto) and Lim (Alfredo) were able to remain in the Aquinos’ good graces only the current President knows for sure. But as in the case of last year’s Luneta hostage fiasco and, now, the Leviste caper, the President’s coddling of these two controversial officials has earned for him—and for the nation—a great deal of embarrassment… In his blog, Santos wrote: “The personal connection of the president with these appointees makes him extremely vulnerable to accusations of favoritism and unprofessional conduct whether the allegations against his appointees are true or not.””
An example of outstanding in-vestigative journalism was the report on the unauthorized trips outside the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) made by former Batangas Gov. Antonio Leviste. Aside from focusing on favoritism in our prison system, the exposé also helped call attention to the issue of presidential appointees.
Convicted for shooting to death his own aide Rafael de las Alas in 2007, Leviste was supposed to be serving a 12-year sentence when he was spotted—by ABS-CBN reporter Anthony Taberna of the advocacy journalism program XXX—outside the Muntinlupa penitentiary, with no restraints and no court permission for his “escapade.”
The report—which the Palace cannot now blame on “jaded” columnists—documented a long suspected racket in the prison system. Rich convicts, like Leviste, get special treatment from prison authorities.
That such misdeeds continue to take place under the administration of President Aquino puts into question his fervent declaration about his Matuwid na Daan. There was nothing righteous about the extraordinary favors granted to Leviste apparently by Director Ernesto Diokno of the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor).
Diokno is a former police officer who had served under erstwhile Manila police chief and now mayor Alfredo Lim. Both Diokno and Lim had been closely identified with former President Corazon C. Aquino whose son has remained chummy with them.
How Diokno and Lim were able to remain in the Aquinos’ good graces only the current President knows for sure. But as in the case of last year’s Luneta hostage fiasco and, now, the Leviste caper, the President’s coddling of these two controversial officials has earned for him—and for the nation—a great deal of embarrassment.
Diokno is a presidential appointee and thus “serves at the pleasure” of Mr. Aquino. This fact has limited what his nominal superior, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, can do to discipline the BuCor director.
After all, Diokno—although situated several rungs lower in the DOJ totem pole—owes his position, not to de Lima, but to the President.
De Lima has actually been reduced to issuing press statements expressing her confidence that the President would act correctly on Diokno’s case. Over the weekend, the DOJ chief was quoted saying: “I’m sure [the President] will do the right thing at the right time.”
The President, in turn, has said he would rely on the case facts gathered by the DOJ as well as its recommendations. Media reports indicated that Mr. Aquino would announce his decision today, Wednesday.
Beyond the President’s apparent lapse of judgment in installing Diokno as BuCor head, the Leviste case has brought up other issues relating to good governance—or, more accurately, the lack of it.
For instance, should Mr. Aquino continue with the custom of installing appointees even to mid-level positions in the bureaucracy?
This practice the Philippines inherited from its former colonial overlords, the Americans who abused the “spoils system” as a way of rewarding political followers. US President Andrew Jackson was widely regarded to have brought this scheme to the extreme.
Over the decades, the Americans have managed to reform their civil service. In our case, however, choice government posts continue to go to the incumbent president’s loyalists in the Jacksonian manner.
In his first months as president, Mr. Aquino has had to fill up an estimated 11,000 government positions, which were left vacant—or forced to be vacated—by the appointees of the previous chief executive. As analyst Doy Santos observed, that is “such an astronomically high number [of appointments] for one person to make.”
A senior policy analyst based in Adelaide, South Australia, Santos is described as “a Master in Development Economics from the University of the Philippines and an MS in Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.”
In his blog, titled The Cusp, Santos noted, “Even for a president who wants to be conscientious about the people he appoints, filling up so many vacancies would pose a serious challenge for even recruitment firms that specialize in this area. So in filling sensitive posts, it is no wonder that presidents turn to people they know, i.e. former colleagues.”
In a blog posting dated February 22, Santos had remarked on another controversial mid-level official appointed by Mr. Aquino, Director Virginia Torres of the Land Transportation Office whom various sources have described as one of the President’s “shooting buddies.”
I found Santos’s observations relevant to the Diokno case, too.
In his blog, Santos wrote: “The personal connection of the president with these appointees makes him extremely vulnerable to accusations of favoritism and unprofessional conduct whether the allegations against his appointees are true or not. It raises the question as to whether the president should exercise the power to make so many appointments and whether he should put such a premium on personal friendship as a basis for making them.”
Santos also wrote: “The Constitution and the Administrative Code of 1987, which give the president his appointive powers, are vague as to the extent of these powers and have been liberally construed to date. Perhaps the time has come to make them more specific through some kind of enabling law or convention.”
Santos added: “Perhaps the time has come for us to consider paring down the number of presidential appointees. In light of past events, perhaps the punishment meted out against those found guilty of abusing the personal trust and confidence of the president should be at the maximum when judges sentence them. The manner by which such political appointees have in the past allegedly used their position to commit grave acts of corruption would provide justification for this.”
Recalling the questionable appointment of Torres to the LTO as well as the problematic posting of another shooting buddy, Rico Puno, as interior undersecretary, Santos concluded: “In the wake of all these incidents, is it time to curtail presidential appointments?”
The tradition of presidential appointments stands in the way of meritocracy and professionalism, which Filipinos have long sought in the civil service. The time has come for our civil servants to work their way up the bureaucratic ladder on the basis of personal performance, not political connections.
The British civil service is often held up as a model for the rest of the world because of, among other strengths, its permanency and reputation for absolute honesty.
Why?
British civil servants are strictly excluded from politics.
Convicted for shooting to death his own aide Rafael de las Alas in 2007, Leviste was supposed to be serving a 12-year sentence when he was spotted—by ABS-CBN reporter Anthony Taberna of the advocacy journalism program XXX—outside the Muntinlupa penitentiary, with no restraints and no court permission for his “escapade.”
The report—which the Palace cannot now blame on “jaded” columnists—documented a long suspected racket in the prison system. Rich convicts, like Leviste, get special treatment from prison authorities.
That such misdeeds continue to take place under the administration of President Aquino puts into question his fervent declaration about his Matuwid na Daan. There was nothing righteous about the extraordinary favors granted to Leviste apparently by Director Ernesto Diokno of the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor).
Diokno is a former police officer who had served under erstwhile Manila police chief and now mayor Alfredo Lim. Both Diokno and Lim had been closely identified with former President Corazon C. Aquino whose son has remained chummy with them.
How Diokno and Lim were able to remain in the Aquinos’ good graces only the current President knows for sure. But as in the case of last year’s Luneta hostage fiasco and, now, the Leviste caper, the President’s coddling of these two controversial officials has earned for him—and for the nation—a great deal of embarrassment.
Diokno is a presidential appointee and thus “serves at the pleasure” of Mr. Aquino. This fact has limited what his nominal superior, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, can do to discipline the BuCor director.
After all, Diokno—although situated several rungs lower in the DOJ totem pole—owes his position, not to de Lima, but to the President.
De Lima has actually been reduced to issuing press statements expressing her confidence that the President would act correctly on Diokno’s case. Over the weekend, the DOJ chief was quoted saying: “I’m sure [the President] will do the right thing at the right time.”
The President, in turn, has said he would rely on the case facts gathered by the DOJ as well as its recommendations. Media reports indicated that Mr. Aquino would announce his decision today, Wednesday.
Beyond the President’s apparent lapse of judgment in installing Diokno as BuCor head, the Leviste case has brought up other issues relating to good governance—or, more accurately, the lack of it.
For instance, should Mr. Aquino continue with the custom of installing appointees even to mid-level positions in the bureaucracy?
This practice the Philippines inherited from its former colonial overlords, the Americans who abused the “spoils system” as a way of rewarding political followers. US President Andrew Jackson was widely regarded to have brought this scheme to the extreme.
Over the decades, the Americans have managed to reform their civil service. In our case, however, choice government posts continue to go to the incumbent president’s loyalists in the Jacksonian manner.
In his first months as president, Mr. Aquino has had to fill up an estimated 11,000 government positions, which were left vacant—or forced to be vacated—by the appointees of the previous chief executive. As analyst Doy Santos observed, that is “such an astronomically high number [of appointments] for one person to make.”
A senior policy analyst based in Adelaide, South Australia, Santos is described as “a Master in Development Economics from the University of the Philippines and an MS in Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.”
In his blog, titled The Cusp, Santos noted, “Even for a president who wants to be conscientious about the people he appoints, filling up so many vacancies would pose a serious challenge for even recruitment firms that specialize in this area. So in filling sensitive posts, it is no wonder that presidents turn to people they know, i.e. former colleagues.”
In a blog posting dated February 22, Santos had remarked on another controversial mid-level official appointed by Mr. Aquino, Director Virginia Torres of the Land Transportation Office whom various sources have described as one of the President’s “shooting buddies.”
I found Santos’s observations relevant to the Diokno case, too.
In his blog, Santos wrote: “The personal connection of the president with these appointees makes him extremely vulnerable to accusations of favoritism and unprofessional conduct whether the allegations against his appointees are true or not. It raises the question as to whether the president should exercise the power to make so many appointments and whether he should put such a premium on personal friendship as a basis for making them.”
Santos also wrote: “The Constitution and the Administrative Code of 1987, which give the president his appointive powers, are vague as to the extent of these powers and have been liberally construed to date. Perhaps the time has come to make them more specific through some kind of enabling law or convention.”
Santos added: “Perhaps the time has come for us to consider paring down the number of presidential appointees. In light of past events, perhaps the punishment meted out against those found guilty of abusing the personal trust and confidence of the president should be at the maximum when judges sentence them. The manner by which such political appointees have in the past allegedly used their position to commit grave acts of corruption would provide justification for this.”
Recalling the questionable appointment of Torres to the LTO as well as the problematic posting of another shooting buddy, Rico Puno, as interior undersecretary, Santos concluded: “In the wake of all these incidents, is it time to curtail presidential appointments?”
The tradition of presidential appointments stands in the way of meritocracy and professionalism, which Filipinos have long sought in the civil service. The time has come for our civil servants to work their way up the bureaucratic ladder on the basis of personal performance, not political connections.
The British civil service is often held up as a model for the rest of the world because of, among other strengths, its permanency and reputation for absolute honesty.
Why?
British civil servants are strictly excluded from politics.
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