MANILA, Philippines — Presidential peace adviser Carlito Galvez Jr. fumed on Tuesday after Senator Raffy Tulfo alleged that the decommissioning of former rebels is tainted with corruption.
“Don’t tell us that we’re corrupt,” a visibly irked Galvez said during the hearing of the Senate Committee on National Defense.
He was responding to Tulfo, who alleged during the hearing that there was corruption in the decommissioning of former members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
The senator cited Galvez’s report to the committee that there were 26, 132 decommissioned combatants, but they only surrendered 4,625 weapons to the government.
These combatants received P100,000 cash each, according to Galvez.
Tulfo questioned this “big discrepancy,” noting that the cash grants given to the surrenderees had already amounted to P2.6 billion.
“There’s corruption here, whether you like it or not,” Tulfo said, speaking partly in Filipino.
“The discrepancy is big. You have to investigate. Someone should be held responsible. There’s big amount of government money that is missing,” he added.
When Galvez remarked that they were not corrupt, Tulfo clarified that he was not referring to the peace adviser but to some people within his organization who might be involved in corruption.
“Definitely, I take offense that you’re already telling us that there’s corruption. I believe that’s not a correct accusation to us,” Galvez said.
But Tulfo stood by his statement that there was corruption in the decommissioning of former rebels.
“Whoever gets hurt, I don’t care,” he said.
He also told Galvez not to be “too defensive” and to just show proof to debunk his corruption allegation.
“I will show proof. I will show proof that we’re not corrupt,” Galvez said.
Tulfo reiterated he was not referring to Galvez: “Why are you angry, Mr. Secretary?”
“Because you’re accusing us that our organization is corrupt,” Galvez answered.