Are we shameless?

MANILA
The Philippines has been in the global news lately because of the exposes on the plunder and corruption wrought by the past administration of Gloria Arroyo.
Recent news has cast us as a nation of thieves and cheats who take every opportunity to grab a quick buck at the expense of the public treasury. The exposes point to several high officials of the Arroyo administration, including Mrs. Arroyo herself and her husband, as having enriched themselves through crooked means. Several cases are being readied by the current government to put these people in jail.
The extent of the looting of the people’s money appears to be wide and the amounts involved great, indicating a methodical, elaborate and brazen way of plunder. As one Arroyo official had instructed one of his associates: “Try to moderate their greed.” Meaning that the crooked government officials’ greed was so insatiable that you couldn’t totally eradicate it but simply control.
It appears from the exposes that Arroyo’s operatives were expert at stealing. And it seems that very few in her government, if at all, had the scruples and will power to resist the temptation to steal. They used their positions to pocket the people’s money. It wasn’t hard to steal, the opportunity was there and all they had to do was put the loot in their pockets.
The plunder was opportunistic and without shame.
Take the example of a military general who was the comptroller of the armed forces. According to government prosecutors, he stole from the military’s budget and extorted from the army’s suppliers of goods and equipment. And it turned out this general had a “green card” in the United States. How could a Filipino general, on active duty, be a US immigrant at the same time?
Or take the official in charge of keeping Philippine elections orderly and clean. He got involved in a scandal that was so way out of his jurisdiction: the setting up of a computerized network to link up all government offices up to the littlest village. How in Rizal’s name did this guy get involved in computerizing government offices when his assignment was to supervise elections?! The scheme, which allegedly involved billions in kickbacks, had to be scuttled by Mrs. Arroyo when the stink over it became overwhelming.
Some police generals went to a global conference in Moscow and there got caught carrying undeclared amounts of dollars in quantities that were way beyond legal limits. The hot money was apparently for the shopping pleasure of the wife of the military chief of staff as well as other generals’ wives.
It has also been revealed that incoming chiefs of the national police and military chiefs of staff get an unauthorized “welcoming” amount (in millions) and a similar hush-hush bonus when they retire. One such general who had projected himself as a “clean-Gene” type of guy had to shoot himself dead when it was revealed that he too, despite his cultivated immaculate image, accepted the customary secret gratuity.
Still another example is a political clan in Mindanao, closely allied with Gloria Arroyo, who allegedly pocketed billions in public money just because they could do it, being indispensable political enforcers of Arroyo. These people lived in grand mansions while the rest of the people in their province lived in great poverty.
Such people have no shame. Their greed overpowers their sense of shame. They don’t have to worry about facing the public with their guilt. Actually they rarely have to face the public because they’re insulated by their status as high public officials and they’re isolated from public view as they enjoy their high-walled palaces and darkly tinted limousines. Wonder how mightily they wrestle with their consciences? Or, wonder if they have consciences at all?
These people are numb about their larcenous deeds. They’ve gotten so used to their thievery that they don’t give their acts any second thoughts. Stealing is already second nature to them.
But what about their families? How do their wives and children feel about their fathers’ corruption?
As an example, when the elections guy was being grilled at a congressional hearing, his son (also a city government official) was stoically sitting behind his dad to give him moral support. The Observer wondered how the son felt at that moment about his father. About his father’s reputation, about their standing among their neighbours and their immediate community.
The son just sat there, seemingly unperturbed.
It seems the offspring of thieving government officials aren’t bothered at all by their parent(s)’ notoriety and ill-repute for being corrupt. The above-mentioned son of the elections guy carries on as if his father weren’t in hot water and has a sorry reputation for being morally bent.
I saw a newspaper photograph of a son of the military general/comptroller posing in his expensive designer garb in the United States. These people have no worries about flaunting their ill-gotten riches and the expensive bling that their easy money can buy.
Apparently the families of these accused thieves in government aren’t shamed by all the exposes incriminating their parents, not bothered by the provenance of the unexplained money their husbands/parents bring home. Don’t the wives and children of these crooks ever wonder how they can live in luxury despite their bread-winners’ ordinary-bureaucrat salaries?
Are we all Filipinos like that, given the chance to enrich ourselves if and when we come to positions of power? Are we a nation of crooks? Are we a shameless people?
Certainly not!
While public officials (with few exceptions) have made government their cash cow, the majority of Filipinos are simple people who go about their daily work and chores with quiet dignity and uncomplaining integrity. Most Filipinos, many of them poor, are deathly scared of government (which can act with impunity against any citizen) who dare not even jaywalk lest they suffer the wrath of abusive policemen. The same is true about Filipinos who live abroad, perhaps even truer because experience shows that Filipinos tend to be more law-abiding and hard-working when they are abroad.
Many Filipinos are scandalized by the crookedness, greed and opportunism of unscrupulous public officials but feel helpless to do anything about such ills because they feel underpowered.
Such is the lot of most Filipinos — voiceless, hopeless and helpless to save their country from the vultures and vermin that feast on their nation’s remaining wealth and treasures.
We may be poor and powerless but we are not without shame. We are embarrassed and ashamed by how our past governments, particularly those of Ferdinand Marcos and Gloria Arroyo, have led us to the road to perdition.
There are those who stole, cheated and lied to us with their bare faces. There are those who took advantage of our powerlessness, our naiveté and our tolerance. There are those who abused our trust and innocence.
They are the ones who are shameless, not us.
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