Corporate Watch

By Amelia H.C. Ylagan

President Rodrigo R. Duterte started the cauldron bubbling

when on Aug. 9, during the celebration of the 118th police
service anniversary at Camp Crame, he said that he believes
police officers should accept gifts if these are given out of
gratitude or generosity. “Well, if you’re given a gift, accept it.
It cannot be bribery because it is allowed by law. What I
mean if there is generosity in them, the anti-graft law says
you cannot accept gifts. (Kalokohan ’yan) That’s nonsense,”
he was quoted by The Philippine Star as saying in its Aug. 11
issue.

Is it allowed, or not allowed by law for civil servants to accept

“gifts”? Republic Act 6713, or the Code of Conduct and
Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees, Section
7 (d) expressly says, “Public officials and employees shall not
solicit or accept, directly or indirectly, any gift, gratuity,
favor, entertainment, loan or anything of monetary value
from any person in the course of their official duties or in
connection with any operation being regulated by, or any
transaction which may be affected by the functions of their
office.”

“If you are able to solve a crime and the family would like to
be generous to you or would nurture a feeling of gratitude for
what you accomplish, then by all means, accept it,” Mr.
Duterte insisted. But he seemingly made even the policemen
themselves uneasy and embarrassed. Philippine National
Police (PNP) spokesman Brig. Gen. Bernard Banac
immediately stepped forward to say they are still bound by
RA 6713 that expressly prohibits the solicitation or
acceptance of gifts in any form despite the pronouncement of
the President. Mr. Banac stressed there is no need for groups
or individuals to gift policemen for tasks accomplished (since)
taxpayers are already paying the policemen their salaries,
the Star article noted.

Senator Panfilo Lacson, a “career policeman” who

immediately opted for commissioning into the Philippine
Constabulary (PC) upon graduation from the Philippine
Military Academy in 1971, and who retired in 2001 as
Chief of the PNP — a 1991 merger of the military PC and
the civilian Integrated National Police (INP) — also did not
agree with Mr. Duterte’s revision of the police rules of
conduct. “Mr. President, insatiable greed starts with simple,
petty graft. It could be more addicting than drugs. There is
no detox, nor is there rehab facility available for addiction to
money,” Mr. Lacson said in his Twitter account.

In his website pinglacson.net, Mr. Lacson recalled that he was

a Lieutenant Colonel with the PC-Metrocom in 1981 when
he led a team that rescued the young Robina Gokongwei,
daughter of taipan John Gokongwei, Jr. (JG Summit Group),
from a kidnap-for-ransom gang. According to a post on his
website called “Lacson: Time to Revisit, Make Anti-Graft
Laws More Implementable” (Aug. 19), “Robina’s grateful
family offered him and his team a hefty reward, but he had
a strict ‘no-take’ policy and he declined it, pointing out he
does not want his men to have the mentality of not helping
‘poor’ complainants who may not afford to give them a
reward. To show their gratitude, the Gokongwei family
decided to donate mobile patrol vehicles to the PC for
Robina’s successful rescue. The donation was coursed through
then PC chief Maj. Gen. Fidel V. Ramos via a deed of donation
in favor of the PC Metrocom.”

Yet for Senator Ronald “Bato” de la Rosa (PMA 1986), also

a former PNP chief (from July 1, 2016 to April 19, 2018),
receiving gifts is no big deal as long as they are given out of
gratitude. “The President is a very pragmatic individual.
Anything that is given in the spirit of goodwill is not a
problem,” Mr. De la Rosa told GMA News. Hard to imagine
how two PMA “cavaliers,” both graduates of the Philippine
Military Academy, can think so differently —
black-and-white for one, and shades of grey for another.
And a little-known phrase in RA 6713 has been called forth
by defenders of the President’s shocking dispensation to
police officers to accept “gifts” in appreciation of good
service:

RA 6713 (d) of Definitions: “‘Receiving any gift’ includes the

act of accepting directly or indirectly, a gift from a person
other than a member of his family or relative as defined in
this Act, even on the occasion of a family celebration or
national festivity like Christmas, if the value of the gift is
neither nominal nor insignificant, or the gift is given in
anticipation of, or in exchange for, a favor.”

The phrase “nominal or insignificant” is what Presidential

Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC) Commissioner Greco
Belgica (who was appointed by Mr. Duterte in January 2018)
drummed upon to justify the “gifts” go-ahead by the
President. (Remember that the PACC was Panfilo Lacson’s
organization with the absolute “no-take” policy on gifts and
bribes.) Mr. Belgica stressed the qualified quantitative
“way-out” for a civil servant to accept “rewards” or tokens
of appreciation for a job well done — in one TV interview he
gave the example of an airport employee receiving
P100,000 for returning P1 million he found to the office
and to the appreciative owner.
In an interview on The Chiefs on Cignal TV last Friday, Mr.
Belgica said, “Kunwari ako, sir, commissioner po ako, ako po
na nakakuha (For example, I as commissioner was the one to
receive) — That’s my salary sir. For me, the P100,000 is just
to get me by, so it’s really not a significant amount to me
because that’s how much I get paid a month.”

Was it insignificant to the airport employee in his example?

According to a write-up in The Philippine Star (March 27,

2013) — written at a time when Mr. Belgica was running
for Senator — as an elder and pastor at The Lord’s Vineyard
Covenant Community (founded by his father, Butch Belgica),
he “capitalizes on the support and votes of his fellow
Christians — 63,000 evangelical churches all over the
Philippines, spread over 42,000 barangays,” Mr. Belgica said
then. With that “influence,” could the preacher not have
preached a detachment to mundane “gifts,” and quoted
Matthew the evangelist (Ch. 5, v. 12): “Rejoice and be glad,
for your reward is great in heaven.”

The keyword in the controversy is “influence.” Outright

bribes are definitely quid pro quo for the power to influence
an outcome expected by the giver. But would the government
employee, at whatever level, have received the “gift” or
token of appreciation if she/he were not in the position and
place to influence the outcome of a situation or predicament
of the taxpayer/gift-giver? Even a “reward,” by Mr. Lacson’s
“no-take” policy at the PACC in his time, would be a “bribe”
for the continuance of the built-in position of influence and
power of a civil servant over the common good. Perhaps gifts
and rewards can be called an “investment” of the giver for
future favors.

What’s in a name? “Bribes,” “gifts,” “rewards” are all

dangerous substances to a civil servant. Once a bounty
beyond salary is experienced, expectations are subliminally
raised. An “addiction to money” in a government employee
is indeed more pernicious than drug addiction, as Mr. Lacson
reminds givers and takers alike.

But as the controversy rages about “gifts” and the thin line
between these and bribes, Justice Secretary Menardo
Guevarra took up from Mr. Belgica’s offered allowable “take”
of P100,000, and urged a review of RA 3019 the
Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and RA 6713 or the
Code of Ethical Standards. “It is difficult to give specific
guidelines because according to the law, it would depend on
the local customs and traditions of the place where the
gift-giving happens. So it is really a relative term, unless of
course the Civil Service Commission would give an exact or
precise definition, let’s say no gift exceeding P1,000 in any
occasion. Right now there is no such rule, so the concept is
flexible, very relative,” Mr. Guevarra said (The Philippine
Star Aug. 20, 2019).

You might have missed the point, Sir.

Rep. Carlos Zarate of Bayan Muna got the point: “Under the
Code of Conduct for Public Officials and Employees,
acceptance of anything of value is prohibited,” he said
(Philippine Star Aug. 23, 2019).