BSKE postponement: Evil scheme of political dynasts

Corruption starts at the barangay level. Examples:

• Barangay officials extort P200,000 per telco cell site permit. The three telcos told then-president Duterte in July 2020 about the racket. That “fee” could be higher in a crookeder admin.

One exposé was in San Fernando, Pampanga. A barangay chairman told two supervisors of a telco that bribe was normal. In fact, their competitor paid up just months before. The money was purportedly for barangay projects and to blunt opposition to the cell site.

Telcos are under government pressure to erect 60,000 more cell towers than the present 30,000. The P12 billion they must pay barangay councils under the table constrains them.

Net effect: 118 million Filipinos suffer poor telecom signal.

• Barangay councilmen pocket “ayuda” allocations. Most prevalent are in health benefits, Christmas and birthday gifts to the elderly, even disaster emergency relief.

DILG cited a barangay in San Jacinto, Pangasinan. Every household was supposed to receive P5,500 social amelioration. But only half, P2,750, was given to each. Councilmen forced each family head to sign receipt of the whole P5,500.

Instead of 1,000 households receiving P5,500,000, only P2,750,000 was released. Officials stole the P2,750,000 remainder.

The racket was widespread. DILG sued 301 barangay men in Ilocos region-wide.

Petty thievery also occurs in gifts for seniors and disaster victims. Withheld from each bag of goodies, for instance, is a pack of spaghetti noodles or a can of corned beef that recipients signed for. When added up, the loot runs to millions of pesos.

• Village officials also filch benefits from city or municipal halls. One scheme was discovered last month in a barangay in Sta. Ana, Manila. Ten residents who died as far back as 2000 were still “collecting” and “signing for” P500 monthly aid for seniors. Total take was P5,000 a month or P60,000 a year.

City hall received a complaint about two long-dead brothers-in-law. The senior sister of one noticed in the ledger supposed up-to-date payments to the deceased brother. The senior daughter of the other noticed the same.

The barangay chairwoman begged in vain for the two to not complain to city hall. The two could not believe that their chairwoman, who they thought was their friend, could cheat the government using their deceased kin.

That’s the malady of barangay residents. They trust the officials in their 42,010 barangays and 41,995 Sangguniang Kabataan. The dishonest take advantage of such trust – or helplessness – to enrich themselves.

Not all barangay/SK officials are crooked. Yet there are no statistics for saints and sinners. Residents only assume that their smiling neighbor who sits in the council is doing everything for their good.

At the start of Duterte’s admin, 35,356 or 84 percent of barangays were classified as “drug-affected.” Either the officials couldn’t combat or were in cahoots with narco-traffickers. By the end of his term, approximately 10,000 were still drug-infested.

Barangay/SK elections (BSKE) must push through on Nov. 2. Good officials need to be given fresh mandate, bad ones removed and termed-out ones retired.

Congress and Malacañang conspired, however, to thwart the people’s right to vote and be voted upon. Last Friday they postponed the BSKE to three long years. They deprived Filipinos suffrage in their basic communities.

BSKE should’ve been held as far back as December 2025. On pretext of “fixing the term” of barangay/SK officials to four years instead of the old three, Congress and Malacañang rescheduled it to November 2026. Last Friday, on new pretext of “setting the term” to five years, they again delayed BSKE to November 2028.

They contrived shallow reasons for this latest postponement. One was that there’s an “oil crisis due to international war.” Yet the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao held parliamentary balloting only last Sept. 14.

Another alibi was that Election Day, the first Monday of November 2026, was to fall on the 2nd, All Souls’ Day, when Filipinos traditionally trek to the provinces to visit the graves of their dearly departed. Election turnout might be dismal. Then again, why didn’t any of 318 congressmen and 24 senators and dozens of President’s men, point up the discrepancy?

The real reason is dynastic politics. Dynasts in Congress want to make barangay/SK officials beholden to them by prolonging their terms till November 2028. That way, quid pro quo, extendees will campaign for the dynasts in the May 2028 presidential-congressional-local balloting.

Eighty-one percent of the House of Reps and 83 percent of the Senate are dynasts. On Sept. 8, 211 of 225 congressmen present voted for BSKE delay. On Sept. 14, 13 of 18 senators present did the same. Three of the five Senate dissenters are among the only four who are not dynasts.

Although the SK law forbids politicians’ relatives up to the second degree, barangays are heavily infiltrated by dynasts.

Four election lawyers led by veteran Romy Macalintal are petitioning the Supreme Court to declare the BSKE postponement as unconstitutional. Congress abused its power to decide on barangay tenures, and the President to enforce it.

Only last Aug. 26, 15 SC justices unanimously ruled against any more political dynasties. One hundred fifty years of dynastic reign since the Spanish regime, 39 years under the 1987 Constitution, should be enough. BSKE should be rid of dynastic manipulation.

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