Greed of Filipino Congressmen Varies

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

 In a huddle with a government contractor in my last visit in Mindanao, he told me that congressmen there are given 10 percent each by a private builder on the entire cost of the project awarded to the latter.

“It depends upon the project. If they are school houses the SOP is much cheaper. 10 percent if it is a highway project”.

He cited that there are two kinds of a solon: The greedy and the less greedy.

 “A Solomon (slang of greedy in Tagalog) and a Solon,” I quipped.

The greedy, even if the contractor has to start the project, would already ask the builder to deliver for him some parts of the SOP or the illegal cut.

SUBSTANDARD - Then Assistant Secretary Tingagun Ampaso Umpa of the Department of Public Works & Highway measured a substandard width of a concrete highway in Lanao del Sur which he blamed on the corrupt DPWH’s officials and contractors in Region 8 (Northern Mindanao). Duterte sacked Umpa because he allegedly fleeced up to two percent commission in every project from a contractor. Umpa blamed his relief on the demolition job done by the DPWH Regional Director, corrupt congressmen, and private builders in the Region. 

That’s why many contractors have credit lines to a lender who imposed a small margin of profit because once in a while the solon would ask the builder for an advance payment of his SOP, I opined as my experienced in Pangasinan dictate.

But a member of the House of Representatives in a District in the Province of Cotabato had the avarice tempered as the lawmaker would wait for the contractor to finish every stages of the project and en cash the corresponding checks.

Probably my source was talking about Progress Billing.

The Billing means the bank releases the sum by tranches on the length of the construction as it progresses by periods.

If Mindanao’s congressmen has a price tag of 10 percent in a major public work. Members of the House of Representatives in Luzon exact 15% to 20% from the contractor.

 Here’s a private builder that would collaborate my thesis that congressmen and his favored contractors agreed on this particular SOP.

In a ten million pesos farm-to-market road  he explained to me how the Filipinos are fleeced.

 “15 percent lang ang tubo ko diyan. 15 percent bigay ko sa congressman, 5 percent sa DPWH bigwigs and the boys nila to divide, and 10 percent kay mayor,” he enumerated.

Here’s what another Luzon based private builder who disagreed with the 15% SOP of the first contractor I mentioned earlier.
 He told me how lucrative the construction business in screwing the government with substandard project:
 “Iyong isang government project namin na worth P20 million plus tumubo kami ng P7 million plus. Binigyan namin ang engineer doon na nagpasok ng kontrata ng P3 million (from the P7 million)”.
He had to give percentages from the total worth of the contract from the National Irrigation Administration to different individuals so he could get the contract and earn a windfall.
 “10% congressman, 10% mayor, 10% s implementing agency,” he stressed.

This was the breakdown son of a gun of the P20 million public works that put the taxpayers at the receiving end:

P7 million: Profit of the contractor and the share of the middleman who is the Engineer.

P2 million: Congressman

P2 million: Mayor

P2 million: Brass at the National Irrigation Authority

P7 million: Remained to the short changed People of the Philippines, HesusMariaHusep!

A congressman in Luzon has an average P1 billion project he or she gets yearly from the national government.

But a District Engineer of the DPWH in Region 1 told me that congressmen in Luzon only asked for ten percent SOP.

“We in the DPWH only ask for five percent SOP for distribution to the boys”.

Boys here include those engineers assigned to evaluate the quality of the work done by the builder.

It means even if the project was substandard as long as they received their parts of the five percent; they approved the project as above board.

It’s another SOP for the in- house official of the Commission on Audit at the DPWH’s District Office who sees to it that all the payments are legal.

Who says, son of a whore, that government work is a thankless job because of the measly salary?

My source in Mindanao said that the customary shares of the DPWH there is 7.5% . 
It means the DPWH’s brass  there are 2.5% greedier than their counterparts in Luzon.

I remembered DPWH Assistant Secretary Tingagun Ampaso Umpa who was sacked last May by President Rodrigo Duterte for grave abuse of authority and alleged acts of corruption.

According to DPWH Region 10 Director Zenaida Tan, Umpa instructed her to tell the contractors located within the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao to deliver to him a 1 to 2 percent project share in Lanao del Sur.

But the neophyte Duterte appointee’s Umpa who considered his firing as a result of the demolition job by Tan and her alleged congressmen cum contractors’ allies accused them as the corrupt officials 

“I was called for a bad news from Malacañang to resign because of an affidavit executed by corrupt Maranao contractors connived by corrupt DPWH Maranao project engineer which I questioned to be investigated supposedly under my office. Let justice prevail,” he said.

Umpa cited an overpriced 2.7-kilometer road concreting that costs P137 million in Lanao.

Mas magnanakaw  allegedly pala itong mga Maranao DPWH officials and contractors.
 According to a District Engineer in Pangasinan, except for the payment of the right of ways (ROW) a one kilometer international standard concrete two-lane pave highway cost the national public coffer P30 million or P78 million for the 2.7 kilometers or cheaper by P59 million than the P137 million in  Lanao.

 Many of these Lanao officials spike their notoriety on corruption since I left Mindanao in 1988. 

We Visayans used to mock a fake Ray Ban with a sign of a B.L (Bausch+Lomb, world's largest suppliers of contact lenses) etched on its two glasses as “Buhat (Made) sa Lanao”. B.L or Buhat sa Lanao sunglasses could short change the Christian buyer by damaging his eyes because it was not scientifically made.

If you wonder that most cross eyed Christians you met in Manila came from Mindanao, you now have a clue after reading this column.

(You can read my selected columns at mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)