Presidential candidate Sen. Panfilo Lacson at the proclamation rally at Grandstand, Imus, Cavite province on Feb. 8, 2022, for the kickoff of the official campaign period for the May 9 national elections. (Photo by NIÑO JESUS ORBETA / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
MANILA, Philippines — Partido Reporma’s standard-bearer Sen. Panfilo Lacson on Wednesday bewailed voters’ penchant for choosing “thieves to run our government,” resulting in the government losing hundreds of billions of pesos to graft and corruption over the last decade.
During the party’s second kick-off activity at the bailiwick of its vice presidential bet, Senate President Vicente Sotto III, in Quezon City, Lacson rallied the support of voters in his attempt to stamp out corruption in government.
He cited how the country has dropped to 117th place among 180 countries in the Transparency International’s 2020 corruption perception index.
Transparency International is a global not-for-profit movement whose mission is to “stop corruption and promote transparency, accountability and integrity at all levels and across all sectors of society.”
The Philippines ranked 113th the year before.
2 kinds of thieves
“This is embarrassing. Because of corruption, we are the last priority for foreign investments,” Lacson said.
“And because no investments are coming in, our people lack jobs, which is why many leave the country to become [overseas Filipino workers],” he added.
Lacson said that in a span of 10 years from 2010 to 2020, the government had been losing an average of P700 billion to graft and corruption.
“Why have we been slumped this low? Because we have kept on choosing the thieves to run our government,” he said, repeating his lines about the two kinds of thieves in society being the street thief and the political thief.
“What is sad about this is that it is us, the voters, who choose who will rob [government coffers],” he said.
The team’s Quezon City rally was punctuated by the appearance of TV celebrity Vic Sotto, the vice presidential bet’s younger brother, and the tandem of Jose Manalo and Wally Bayola, friends from the noontime show “Eat Bulaga!”
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