Government addressing corruption cases

MANILA, Philippines - Malacañang is holding dialogues with the prosecution service and the judiciary to speed up the investigation of corruption cases and convict the guilty.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said the government has taken steps to eliminate the problem.

“There are already convictions and I hope that this will be enough for those in the World Economic Review (sic) and whoever is making a review of the economic situation in the Philippines to understand that we are not sleeping on it,” he said.

Ermita said he is personally overseeing efforts to address corruption as head of the task force on the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA).

“Our efforts against corruption are continuing,” he said.

In its latest Global Competitiveness Index, the World Economic Forum (WEF) ranked the Philippines 87th out of 133 economies.

This was a drop from the previous 71st place of the Philippines.

The biggest problem of the Philippines was corruption, followed by inefficient bureaucracy, inadequate infrastructure, policy instability, access to financing and tax regulation, the WEF said.

The Philippines has not met the criteria for anti-corruption of the United States-based Millennium Challenge Corp. for countries seeking to receive grants from the MCA.       – Marvin Sy