Transparency on demand

A Yahoo! news article on leading United States Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney provided some interesting insight on how Americans view rich public officials and aspirants to public office.

Romney’s wealth was pegged at US $190 million to $250 million, making him richer than the last eight presidents from Richard Nixon to Barack Obama combined.

While estimating his election chances against Obama is premature at this point, especially after the incumbent US president reportedly enjoyed a resurgence of popularity despite the weak economy, the article provides a useful comparison for how Philippine public officials ought to be transparent to the voting public.

One report about President Benigno Aquino III’s personal wealth which rose substantially one year after the elections prompted some critics to demand an explanation of how he became richer.

The same critics who are affiliated with Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo would be silent about how Chief Justice Renato Corona, who has issued rulings favorable to the former president including an immediate midnight approval of her right to travel despite pending court charges, managed to acquire millions of pesos worth of condominium units on a salary worth slightly more than P600,000 a year.

Aquino belongs to a landed class in Tarlac even if the Aquino family’s Hacienda Luisita has been levied with a Supreme Court decision that authorized distribution of land to the plantation’s farmers.

Even then, the country’s public officials especially those higher up in the bureaucracy manage to get away with misdeclaring their statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) with no one being the wiser.

This is so unlike the situation in the US where every prospective candidate for public office, especially those gunning for the White House, are grilled, poked at and examined like a frog in a biology class.

The ongoing impeachment trial which has slowly unveiled piece by tedious piece the properties owned by the Chief Justice is being dogged at every turn by his lawyers such as former justice Serafin Cuevas. Cuevas asked whether one such unit, the Bellagio, was paid for by Corona himself or by his children thus setting the ground for a standard of evdience of “reasonable doubt” in the corruption charges lodged against him.

Whatever the outcome of the impeachment trial, the mandate for public officials and would-be candidates to maintain transparency stands. It should not be glossed over by loopholes, non-disclosures and the legal maneuverings of pricey lawyers.