No surprise

said the report of Transparency International is not surprising because of the failure of the government to show sincere efforts to combat corruption.

Lacson particularly cited the case of former Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon, who he said could very well be the poster boy of corruption in government.

“The kid glove treatment accorded to him by the President does not speak well of a sincere and determined effort in combating corruption,” Lacson said in a text message.

He noted that the negative perception on the Philippines would stay despite the repeated pronouncements and threats made by President Rodrigo to

“I can only opine that words don’t really matter much unless matching action is seen by those who judge,” he added.

But to Sen. Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara, the report of the global anti- graft organization that the Philippines was among the most corrupt countries in the world was puzzling.

Based on the report, Somalia is the most corrupt with a rating of 9 while New Zealand is the most transparent with a rating of 89. Countries are rated between 0 and 100 with 0 being the most corrupt.

“I’m wondering why and would like to see why we went down when we were just cited as having the most budget transparency in Asia recently,” Angara said in a text message.

The senator was referring to the Open Budget Survey (OBS) 2017 wherein the Philippines got an open budget index (OBI) of 67, securing the top spot in Asia for budget transparency.

The OBS is a biennial survey conducted by the International Budget Partnership (IBP) which assesses budget transparency based on the amount and timeliness of budget information governments make available to the public.

The 2017 OBI of the Philippines was three points higher than its 2015 score of 64, surpassing Indonesia (64), Jordan (63), Japan (60), and South Korea (60).