[Pinoy Criminology] An appeal to prosecutors: Jail the corrupt, even if they were your ‘padrinos’

There is something strangely heroic in the sight of the Office of the Ombudsman doing everything it can to investigate and indict high-level corrupt politicians, government bureaucrats, and business contractors. A few mid-level officers from the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) have already been arrested. The most notorious contractor, Sarah Discaya — symbol of everything rotten in the flood control empire — has at last surrendered to the police. These are small victories, and they give a flicker of hope in a country where hope has long been traded, pawned, and mortgaged to corruption.

The Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI) tried to pierce the gloom. They named senators and congressmen, turned over boxes of evidence to the Ombudsman, and dared to suggest that sacred cows, too, could be slaughtered. But lacking subpoena powers, lacking resources, lacking even the basic institutional oxygen to breathe, some of its members eventually resigned. They saw the mountain they needed to climb, and realized they were handed teaspoons instead of climbing gear. (READ: Two years or two months: How long will the ICI actually last?)

The people watch all these with a peculiar mix of excitement and dread. They know the gravity of the flood control corruption. They know the deaths during the rainy season, the villages swallowed by water, the children carried away by currents that should not have existed had the river dikes been real and not imaginary lines on budget papers. They understand, even if only intuitively, that deterrence works only when punishment is swift, certain, and severe. Swift, certain, and severe — three words the Filipino criminal justice system too often treats as poetry, not policy.

Yet, despite the early strides, a creeping fear settles in: very few will ever be held accountable. Many of those involved will escape unscathed, untouched, unbothered — like they always do. Because now the investigations involve senators and congressmen across the political divide, and suddenly the flood control scandal threatens the very foundation of the Marcos administration.

The real corrupt are gleeful. They welcome political chaos; they welcome regime change; they welcome anything that will bury investigations beneath noise. And the Filipino people — gullible to propaganda from all sides, always ready to wage war over half-truths and Facebook memes — fall into the trap again. They fight each other instead of the thieves who steal from them. And the cycle repeats: no one gets punished, everyone claims victimhood, and everyone resurrects themselves just in time for the next election.

But there is a way out of this. A path that relies not on luck nor political benevolence, but on institutional muscle long left underused. The Department of Justice (DOJ), the top law enforcement agency in this country, must be empowered to take on this national scourge. And the tool is already there: Department Circular No. 20.

DC 20, crafted by then-secretary Jesus Crispin “Boying” Remulla, is not just another memo gathering dust in a bureaucratic drawer. It establishes new guidelines for the investigation of criminal cases. It requires prosecutors to take an active role in investigations, not merely sit in offices waiting for cases to arrive already dead on their desks.

Under DC 20, prosecutors must coordinate closely with law enforcement — PNP, NBI, and other agencies — so that evidence gathering is no longer a fragmented, disjointed ritual but a synchronized effort. The circular mandates that a prima facie case with reasonable certainty of conviction must exist before a complaint is elevated to court. Not just allegations, not just gossip, not just paperwork masquerading as proof, but a case that can stand, walk, and fight in the courtroom.

This is not cosmetic reform. This is the DOJ committing itself to modernizing the criminal justice process, making case build-up efficient, coherent, and purposeful. DC 20 recognizes that conviction rates rise only when the preparation before filing is solid. It aims to correct the long-standing malaise of prosecutors inheriting weak cases and then being blamed for the inevitable acquittals. It is a shift toward proactive justice, not reactive paperwork.

And this shift is exactly what the fight against flood control corruption needs.

DC 20 should be the instrument that finally empowers regional, provincial, and city prosecutors to take command of the investigative process. They have the structure, the manpower, and the geographical breadth. With substandard projects and ghost projects sprouting like weeds across the archipelago, prosecutors already have starting evidence in hand. If the public knows prosecutors can now investigate actively, citizens will know exactly where to go. They can file complaints with the police, NBI, or directly with prosecutors who are, by mandate, now obligated to begin gathering evidence — not next year, not after another administration, not after another tragic flood.

Cases involving officials with salary grade 26 can be transferred to the Ombudsman. But cases whose accused fall under prosecutorial authority must be pursued independently. If this dual track is used well, the nation might finally see a systemic — not selective — reckoning. Because Bulacan and Oriental Mindoro are not outliers; they are previews. Every province has its own catalogue of flood control scams. And flood control is but one chapter in a thick book of infrastructural deceit: farm-to-market road scams, irrigation scams, school building scams, hospital construction scams, jail and prison building scams. All these must be scrutinized, prosecuted, convicted — together.

But all this depends on courage and independence.

For DC 20 to breathe life into justice, prosecutors must grow spines as well as skills. Many fear risking their careers. Many owe favors to the very politicians who plucked them from obscurity. Padrino politics has a long memory. But if prosecutors are ethical lawyers, if they are true to their oath, if they believe “justice should be pursued wherever the axe falls,” then DC 20 is their moment. The former DOJ secretary who crafted DC 20 said exactly that. This must be the creed of every prosecutor: pursue justice, not privilege.

Because unless they take a stand, the bulk of the corrupt structure remains untouched. Even now, in the supposed golden age of anti-corruption investigations, the corrupt continue their operations with boldness and confidence. They know the spotlight is aimed only at the top. They know partisan chaos will drown the truth. They know regime change will reboot the system — again in their favor.

And so this becomes a plea to the more than 2,000 prosecutors nationwide:

Be the prosecutors the Filipino people expect you to be. Use DC 20 as it was meant to be used. Take the cudgels for the ordinary Filipino drowned — literally and figuratively — by corruption. Partner with police and NBI. Build strong cases.

Jail the corrupt, even if they were your padrinos.

The Filipino people are counting on you — not to watch the cycle repeat itself, but to finally break it. – Rappler.com

Raymund E. Narag, PhD, is an associate professor in criminology and criminal justice at the School of Justice and Public Safety, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale.