Opinion

Plundering pols begrudge soldiers their pensions

GOTCHA - Jarius Bondoc - The Philippine Star

April 19, 2023 | 12:00am

Government released P14-billion first quarter pensions for 137,649 veterans. The “entitlements are the least we can do to show gratitude and respect,” it said.

“Ridiculous!” Finance Sec. Ben Diokno countered. He alleged that military men outlive most Filipinos. Recruited at 20, they retire at 40 then collect pension till 90. On Diokno’s advice, President Marcos Jr. will slash retirees’ pensions and even deduct those from their active-duty pay. The admin’s Senate and House supermajorities will enact it.

Diokno’s wrong. Mandatory AFP retirement is age 56 or 30 years service, whichever is longer, under PDs 1638 and 1650. Highest authorities approve earlier retirements at pro rata pension. AFP was removed from GSIS in 1997. Before that, crooks in the AFP Retirement and Separation Benefits System dissipated soldiers’ contributions.

Soldiers risk lives 24/7 for the country. They accept hardship posts far away from families. Physiques, minds, emotions can degrade faster than other public employees’.

Diokno, government’s highest paid official in 2021, received P41.81 million from multiple positions as BSP governor, Monetary Board chairman, etc. It will take ex-PNP chief Panfilo Lacson, who retired as four-star general, 18 pension years to match Diokno’s one-year take. In 2020, Diokno got P19.79 million.

A year’s pensions for 137,649 veterans is P56 billion. Merely 30 percent of the P183-billion 2023 flood-control budget. Lawmakers plunder flood funds through ghost projects. They expect soldiers to defend the dynastic status quo. They even corrupt servicemen to be bodyguards and hitmen.

In 2019, House Majority Leader Rolando Andaya accused then-budget chief Diokno of inserting P332 billion for flood controls in three years’ national budgets. Of that total, P385 million went to a town in Bicol that, state engineers swore, doesn’t even flood. That town’s mayor is stepfather of Diokno’s son-in-law.

The mayor used to be a public works contractor with Diokno’s son-in-law as stockholder. The company is 49 percent partner of another contractor in P551-million roadworks. Denying all those in a press release, Diokno dared Andaya, now dead, to sue him (links to The STAR reports below).

Veteran pensions ballooned when soldiers’ salaries were doubled in 2017. For Diokno, whose job is to raise money for pensions, it’s “the elephant in the room.”

Diokno shouldn’t begrudge soldiers their higher pay. They deserve global compensation rates like he did at BSP. Before the hikes, a Filipino four-star general’s monthly salary was lower than that of a US Army private. (Links to my researches below.)

Besides, the Constitution guarantees soldiers’ benefits. Article XVI, General Provisions, Section 7 declares: “The State shall provide immediate and adequate care, benefits and other forms of assistance to war veterans and veterans of military campaigns, their surviving spouses and orphans.”

Their pensions are a gift from the Filipino people, retired admiral Ariston delos Reyes said. Government cannot take it back. The law frowns on diminution of compensation. Demoralization may set in.

The real elephant in the room is the past admin’s over-borrowing, Akbayan leader and former Malacañang official Ronald Llamas said. Government debts in 1946-2016 totaled P5.9 trillion. Then the Duterte presidency, where Diokno was among the top economic managers, borrowed P7.3 trillion.

That admin cannot claim to have needed money for the pandemic. Among the pre-pandemic loans was from China, for an unwanted 72-meter high dam when a seven-meter Japanese weir would have sufficed. Worse, that admin squandered borrowings, including P42-billion pricey medical supplies from Chinese fly-by-nights like Pharmally.

Another elephant in the room is unabated tax evasion and smuggling, Llamas said. Marcos Jr.’s family owes P203 billion in overdue estate taxes. His appointees abet onion and sugar smuggling cartels to which government loses multitrillion-peso revenues. BIR and Customs are under Diokno as finance secretary.