MANILA – Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra on Tuesday said the Task Force against Corruption (TFAC) will ink a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB) and the Commission on Audit (COA) soon to consolidate efforts to crack down on corruption in the remaining months of the Duterte administration.
“(W)e hope to sign it (MOA) next week,” Guevarra said in a message to reporters.
He added that TFAC can take more effective action against corruption through a system with deputized resident ombudsmen in government agencies.
“With the cooperation and support of the OMB, we shall soon deploy DOJ prosecutors and COA (Commission on Audit) auditors as resident ombudsmen in various graft-prone agencies of the government. Although not highly publicized, the task force has been building up a lot of corruption cases reported to us,” Guevarra said.
During his final State of the Nation Address (SONA), President Rodrigo Duterte expressed frustration and admitted he may not be able to eradicate corruption before his term ends next year.
Guevarra noted the President candidly admitted that corruption is nearly impossible to eradicate.
“I agree with him. there is not a single country in the world where corruption in one form or another does not exist. the challenge is to create a framework where corruption will be difficult to thrive, such as adopting electronic transactions, reducing red tape, streamlining legal processes, and imposing stiffer penalties,” he said.
He added that eradicating corruption is not the responsibility of the government alone.
“This is equally the moral duty of every citizen to ensure that corruption is not abetted, but is rather exposed and prosecuted,” Guevarra said.
Despite the TFAC only being created by a mere memorandum from the President, Guevarra believes the body can make a difference in the fight against corruption.
“It (was) not created by an EO (executive order) nor by an AO (administrative order) which effectively has the force of law but that notwithstanding the absence of express powers, it will exert greater efforts to help the President in his anti-corruption drive in the remaining months of his administration,” he added. (PNA)
Source: Philippines News Agency