PCO

From our quiet town, we watch the heavy rain lash the fields and rivers swell. The sky is dark. It has rained hard all night.

Fear of floods hangs over every home. Families peer nervously out their windows, wondering how much more water their houses can take.

But what angers them more is knowing this water carries something far filthier: corruption.

Yesterday, September 9, Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson stood on the Senate floor and laid it bare. The receipts are in. The stink is worse than we imagined.

It takes rare courage to face the powerful. To call out wrongdoing without hesitation. Senators like Ping Lacson show this leadership. The country needs more of it.

Start with the group dubbed by Lacson as BGC (Bulacan Group of Contractors). Its members bagged billions in flood control projects.

But they are not masterminds. They are co-conspirators. They allowed themselves to be used, for a fee. The bigger operators are in government.

Former Bulacan 1st Acting District Engineer Brice Hernandez testified that Myla Santos of SYMS Construction delivered billions in cash to his DPWH office.

Billions. In several boxes.

He said his former boss, Bulacan District Engineer Henry Alcantara, later fetched the billions packed neatly in boxes. Alcantara denied it.

Hernandez did not just talk. He showed photos of wads of cash stacked on a billiard table, ready for distribution. Billions on the table. Billions for the taking.

But the DEs are not the end of the road.

They are just bagmen with government IDs. After the DEs collected the money, who received it from them?

Ghost projects and cloned flood controls don’t happen without blessing from above.

District engineers may draw the plans. Contractors may sign the deals. But real power lies with their protectors.

That brings us to former DPWH Secretary Manuel Bonoan.

According to Lacson, Bonoan; Roberto Bernardo, former DPWH Undersecretary; and Mayor Rene Maglanque of Candaba formed MBB Global Properties through their children.

MBB Global Properties Corporation owns the almost P1-billion-worth Wyndham Garden Hotel in Clark, Pampanga.

Maglanque also used to head Globalcrete Builders, which bagged over ₱2.195 billion in government flood control projects from 2018 to 2024.

So when Bonoan told President Marcos Jr., before he was replaced, that ghost projects in Bulacan were an “isolated case,” was he telling the truth, or protecting Globalcrete and his own backyard?

Then there is Undersecretary Catalina Cabral. Lacson said she personally texted newly installed Senate President Tito Sotto, asking if he wanted to insert ₱500 million in the proposed 2026 National Expenditure Program (NEP).

Imagine that. Half a billion pesos. Offered like it was a Christmas ham.

Hernandez’s billiard-table cash. Alcantara’s boxes and photos with politicians. Contractors and DEs as co-conspirators. Undersecretaries as fixers. Cabinet members with family names on company ledgers.

This is why the people’s anger runs deep. Galit ang tao, at manhid na lang ang hindi makakaramdam nito.

Senate hearings and Lacson’s privilege speeches have solved half the puzzle. The contractor side. The bagmen. The engineers.

But the other half remains untouched: the political and government benefactors of these contractors. The ones who sponsor the projects, protect the syndicates, and pocket the lion’s share.

Remember, this is not just happening in Bulacan. This is a microcosm of a larger rot spreading across the country.

The modus is clear. Across the country, only the names change.

So here is the challenge, Mr. President. You said you are very angry. Then show it. Identify the political benefactors. Prosecute and jail them.

Not just the district engineers. Not just the small contractors. The big fish. Their bosses. Gurami lamang ang mga ito, lapu-lapu ang kanilang mga amo.

The public is hungry for blood. Hungry for justice.

If you stop short, if you only punish the small fry, people will shrug and say what they’ve always said: sabi na nga ba, puro ingay, wala rin naman mangyayari.

At kapag hindi umabot sa malalaking isda ang pananagutan, iisa lamang ang itatanong ng taumbayan:

Hanggang diyan na lamang ba ang galit mo, Mahal na Pangulo?

Ed Javier

Ed Javier is a veteran communicator with over 34 years of professional experience both in the private and public sectors. He is also an entrepreneur, political analyst, newspaper columnist, broadcast and on-line journalist.