EDITORIAL: No Killing the Pork

WHISTLEBLOWER Benhur Luy is the man of the hour.
Not a few were impressed—if not shocked—by the apparent casualness of Luy’s testimony as he described details of how Napoles managed to get her dirty little hands on the millions of pesos in government funds.

Luy’s lurid tales of forgery and collusion with lawmakers comes as a direct affront to the millions of Filipinos mired in poverty. A slap in the face of the jobless, the underpaid workers and, most of all, to the taxpayer who religiously pay their duties only to have the likes of Napoles steal it away.

While most of us are busy with the daily struggle of making ends meet, Napoles and her cohorts in Congress splurge on public funds and lead lives of unimaginable wealth and luxury. And to think that Napoles is just one of many involved in this decades-old scam, is enough to make you sick–sick of all the rotten, dirty scumbags who run our government.

Calls have been made to scrap the pork barrel system. Well and good. Even if there is nothing wrong with the system in the first place. But, considering the perks of being in power and how politicians spend, cheat (even kill) in this country to win an election, it is very hard to imagine a Congress without its pork. Napoles’ cohorts in government may be cringing in fear of impending implication—but the horror of being without the PDAF to a crooked lawmaker is a hundredfold greater.

(Image source: http://everyoneisstupidbutme.com)

Everything was roses until Luy had a falling out with his employer Napoles, who also happens to be his relative. Like whistleblowers before him, Luy is now state witness, a mob insider-turned-squealer. Like all whistleblowers before him, his courage to spill the beans on the pork barrel scandal is admirable. But killing the pork will be easier said than done. Its fate, after all, rests in the hands of people who are in the same club as those accused of abusing it. #OpinYon #Editorial #Philippines

Related articles

• Plunder cases vs Napoles, lawmakers for P10-B pork barrel scam to push through (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• ” Unraveling the Pork Barrel Queen “ (carnecerannarose.wordpress.com)
• Rappler Newscast | September 18, 2013 (rappler.com)
• It’s no-pork diet for ‘pork’ scam suspect Napoles (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Kapunan: Napoles is scapegoat of corrupt lawmakers (rappler.com)
• INFOGRAPHIC: Pork barrel trail – how gov’t funds end with Napoles (rappler.com)
• The principal whistleblower in the P10 billion pork barrel scam Benhur Luy on Thursday testified that his former boss, Janet Lim Napoles, shared 50-50 with… By Macon Ramos-Araneta | September 13, 2013 (manilastandardtoday.com)
• Santiago: Napoles has ‘pork warriors’ (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Pork Barrel (cedricmondero.wordpress.com)
• “Pork barrel”! (michaelabaluyut04.wordpress.com)