Anti-corruption drive slackened in last few months of Aquino administration: SWS survey
Effort to address corruption slackened during the last few months of the administration of former President Benigno Aquino III, an independent pollster said on Wednesday.
In the 2016 Surveys of Enterprises on Corruption conducted among 950 respondents from the business sector from February 2 to May 6, Social Weather Stations president Mahar Mangahas said the effort against corruption during the previous administration started very well and was maintained up to 2015.
"But there was backsliding in 2016," he said during the presentation of the survey in Makati City.
The survey, which was the 13th since 2000, was conducted in partnership with the National Competitiveness Council (NCC).
Among the government agencies that recorded notable cases of backsliding in 2016 were the Department of Transportation and Communications, which garnered "poor" rating or -25 percent; Land Transportation Office, "bad" or -47 percent; Bureau of Internal Revenue, "poor" or -27 percent; and Bureau of Customs, "very bad" or -68 percent.
Overall, Mangahas said 63 percent of the respondents see "a lot" of public sector corruption, up from 56 percent in 2013, "disappointingly far" above the record-low 43 percent in 2012.
He said this was "a return" to the 60-77 percent range under the administration of former President and now Pampanga Representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, and "equal" to the 63 percent in 2000 under the government of former President and now Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada.
Among the businessmen, 35 percent admitted of having "personal knowledge" of a corrupt transaction with government in the last three months in their line of business, up from record low 32 percent in 2015. The figure was 33-38 percent under Aquino's, or superior to 37-44 percent under Arroyo's.
Forty-two percent of the respondents also admitted that most companies in their sector of business gave bribes to win public sector contracts, up from record low 39 percent in 2015. It was 39-42 percent under Aquino's, but "superior" to 45-57 percent under Arroyo's.
Mangahas said businessmen who were being solicited for a bribe rose to 49 percent from the 44-50 percent range in the early part of the Aquino administration, and 60-71 percent under Arroyo's.
Only 10 percent of those solicited for a bribe reported it, he said, noting that the rest did not report believing that it would just be an exercise "in futility" and "it's not going to help."
Mangahas expressed hope that the latest survey results would be "taken seriously" by the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte.
Of the 950 respondents, 633 came from the small and medium enterprises, while 317 from large companies; 23 percent came from the manufacturing sector, 14 percent from wholesale and retail trade, 10 percent from other service and repair activities, and the rest from other sectors.
The survey has a margin of error of +/-3 percent and was conducted in the National Capital Region, Metro Angeles, Cavite-Laguna-Batangas, Iloilo City, Metro Cebu, Cagayan de Oro/Iligan City, and Metro Davao. Celerina Monte/DMS
