President Aquino. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—An alliance of religious groups in the country has expressed disappointment and frustration over the three-year-old Aquino administration particularly for its supposed failure to punish the corrupt and resolve cases of human rights violations.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, the Association of Major Religious Superiors in the Philippines (AMRSP) also expressed dismay over how the government was handling issues on ecology, agrarian reform and the plight of “whistle blowers,” particularly Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada.
“We are now in the third year of Aquino’s term and it is time we ask ourselves so many questions: akin to the question, ‘Which way Lord?’, we ask those in authority: where is this government leading us?” said the AMRSP.
The statement titled “Where Does the Daang Matuwid Lead Our People?” was posted on CBCPNews, the official news service of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines.
While it recognized several government agencies, including the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Education and the Department of Justice for its effort to fight corruption, the group lamented the continuing violence and impunity under the Aquino administration.
“Day by day in so many places, unabated killings take place as if it were the most normal thing to happen in a civilized and Christian country like ours,” said the group.
“We raise our voices with the victims of extrajudicial killings whose numbers are on the rise each day,” the AMRSP said.
“What do these killings mean? Is there still a rule of law? Are we back to the former days of anarchy – when the law of guns, influence and money ruled? Is this what Daang Matuwid means? Where is this government leading us? Where are we going?” it asked in the statement, its strongest so far against the current administration.
The group also said it was saddened over the persisting corruption and abuse on the use of public funds by some congressmen and senators.
“No big fish has been convicted since 2010 and with the way the tentacles of the corrupt have stymied the judicial process, President Aquino’s term might be over and the cases will still languish at the courts,” it pointed out.
The AMRSP also scored “the grinding poverty, agrarian unrest, assaults of integrity of creation, the trafficking of our women and children,” while the government celebrated a supposedly robust economy.
The group expressed its unhappiness with the way the Aquino administration has been treating the case of Lozada, the star witness in the scuttled $329-million national broadband network deal with China’s ZTE Corp. during the Arroyo administration.
“It is unthinkable to imagine that Jun’s heroic act that has put him and his family, not only in danger, but in a state of continuous dislocation would be in vain,” said the AMRSP.
“We cannot go back to ‘business as usual’ simply because ‘higher-up’ officials want to get back at Jun. We cannot understand the indifference that the PNoy government is showing about Jun Lozada,” the group lamented.
Lozada is currently facing graft charges for allegedly granting leasehold rights over public lands to his brother and to a private firm with connections to him and his wife when he was head of the Philippine Forest Corp. in 2007.