Today, about 5,000 demonstrators have marched the streets of Manila. Although today marks the 116 years of Philippine independence, the demonstrators marched for a different purpose: the ouster of several politicians implicated in what appeared to be the biggest graft scandal in President Benigno Aquino's reign as the country's commander-in-chief despite his strong stance against corruption, according to Renato Reyes Jr, one of the organizers.
Reyes said over the phone that the demonstration aims to pressure Philippine authorities to speed up cases against those who allegedly pocketed money from a scheme that involved the diversion of lawmakers' discretionary funds.
In July of last year, the Philippine Daily Inquirer had exposed the 10 billion-peso ($228 million) fund scam, which led to a national inquiry focusing on businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles as the alleged mastermind. A month later, she was arrested over a separate criminal case involving her former assistant and now government whistleblower Benhur Luy. Last week, the Office of the Ombudsman had formally indicted Lim-Napoles and Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada and Bong Revilla for alleged misuse of funds. All of the accused have denied the charges lodged against them.
Lim-Napoles then shared that she had also dealt with Budget Secretary Butch Abad during his term as a congressman and also said that Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala had given his approval to several farm projects from which some of the legislators allegedly gotten kickbacks. The two government officials has since denied her allegations.
Senior fellow Malcolm Cook at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore, "This scandal is having an increasingly negative impact on Aquino's administration. It's also clearly diverting the Senate away from its responsibilities. At the moment, the Senate in particular, where most of the accusations are focused, is preoccupied with the scandal."
Bloomberg said Lim-Napoles, who is seeking state-witness protection, has claimed to have dealt with at least 20 current and former senators and at least 100 sitting and ex-congressmen on shady government deals. Prosecutors have said that Lim-Napoles, whose husband is a former marine major, had set up fake non-government organizations meant for receiving congressional funds for development projects that either produced substantial or no results. Portions of the money for the development projects are routed back to the lawmakers, prosecutors added.
