Palace: PHL's anti-corruption record hit a low under Arroyo

The 2010 Global Integrity Report branding the Philippines as “very weak" in terms of governance and dealing with corruption had only covered the last year of the Arroyo administration, Malacañang pointed out Thursday. In an interview with Palace reporters, deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte clarified that the report covered the June 2009-June 2010 period. Global Integrity, a Washington, DC-based nonprofit organization, tracks governance and corruption trends around the world using local teams of researchers and journalists to monitor openness and accountability. “We were not here yet for the period that was assessed. That was the last year of the administration of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo," she said. Valte is hopeful that Global Integrity’s next report would show an improvement on the country's anti-corruption rating after taking into account the Aquino administration “doing everything to improve on [its] governance and [its] anti-corruption [drive]." Rep. Edcel Lagman had used the 2010 Global Integrity Report to criticize the Aquino administration. In response, Presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda released an online statement on the Official Gazette, pointing out that the legislator was obviously unaware of the assessment period covered by the report. “When Rep. Lagman said the report ‘unmasked’ as ‘lacking in substance and performance’... the high-profile campaign on ‘good governance and less corruption,’ he was actually issuing an indictment of the former President he so slavishly serves," Lacierda said. Lacierda lambasted Lagman’s “slipshod manner" in attempting “to make political hay of what is actually a damning indictment of the previous dispensation," not letting it pass that former President Arroyo had proclaimed May as Anti-Graft and Corruption Awareness Month. — MRT/VS, GMA News