The Porky Thing!

Since the time that whistle-blower Benhur Luy appeared last July to the public, revealing the number one controversy that the Republic of the Philippines is now facing; the PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund) scam. Everyone seems to be clamoring and protesting about this. It is good to know that the social media is playing its great role in expressing the voice of the people; from the market place to the high society.

“Abolish Pork Barrel!” “Janet Napoles must be penalized!”. “Stop Corruption!” These are what we can often hear from the mouths of everybody and also what we can read in some of the social networking sites. However, do we really know what is really the meaning of what we are crying for? Or do we really know exactly what it entails us to do after?

Let me give you a brief background of the “Pork Scam”. The pork barrel scam controversy first revealed in July 2013 involving five senators, Bong Revilla, Juan Ponce Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada, Bongbong Marcos and Gringo Honasan and 23 representatives to transfer their pork barrel funds with a total of 10 billion pesos in the fake non-government organizations (NGOs) for the non-existent projects. The alleged mastermind of pork barrel scam by whistleblower named Benhur Luy was Janet Lim Napoles, CEO and president of JLN Corp..

Now that Napoles is being charged guilty of this case, what about the senators who are involved? It will really take a long time for them to be convicted of such crime for they belong to the big names in the society.

May I just remind you that Napoles is not the only one who was able to wrong our country, and our people. And how can we ever stop corruption? Can we stop it by abolishing the PDAF? Again, PDAF is supposed to allocate funds equally to every congressional district to be used for the residents’ most urgent needs. And who knows the needs of these congressional communities better than the people they have elected to represent them? Well, I can see here that we have trusted the wrong people. We were deceived by the things that they have promised before we have casted our votes.

Another thing, we can see students rallying in the streets, marching and screaming to stop corruption. Is this what we are supposed to do? Yes for some reasons maybe. But come to think of it, if we do this, will the people up there will ever listen to us? I don’t say that expressing our sentiments and exercising our right for the Freedom of Expression is wrong but let me tell you that we are being sent to school to study. To what? Of course to become better citizens of this nation. Much better than what we have now. To what? To become good leaders someday or maybe to become the best that we might have. For what? For the betterment and welfare of our sick society. Why don’t we just do our own thing, let them do their jobs and let us wait for our turn.

This PDAF scam just reminds us that we are the victims of the crimes that is unknowingly we are also accomplices from the very start.