Trusting the SALN

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor GUILLERMO TEJIDA III Desk Editor PATRICK PANGILINAN Busines Editor NIDA A. BUENAFE Sports Editor RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

After all the attention that has recently been given to the statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) in the impeachment case of Chief Justice Renato Corona, the proposal of Sen. Ralph Recto for the Civil Service Commission to conduct a nationwide education campaign in all government offices for the proper filing of new SALN makes sense.

One of the issues being tackled in the ongoing impeachment trial is the claim of the prosecution panel that Corona undervalued numerous real estate properties in his SALN, arguing that the Chief Justice’s inaccurate declaration in his SALN was a violation of the Constitution and betrayal of public trust. If the ongoing impeachment court has shown that the Chief Justice himself, whose knowledge of the laws is supposed to be better than most and whose integrity is supposed to be beyond question, has filed a SALN that seems to be defective and inaccurate; what can we expect from the SALNs of lower ranked and potentially less competent government officials?

According to Malacañang, CSC chairman Francisco Duque has recently issued a memorandum discussing the new format and a guide in filling out the SALN. If there is one benefit from the impeachment trial of Corona, it would be making the entire country aware of the relevance of that document that has been ignored by both government officials and the general citizenry for too long. Based on the SALN of the Chief Justice, it would be safe to assume that most SALNs of other officials at all levels of government could use some fine tuning if they are to reflect the true status and wealth of these public officials.

The new guidelines by the CSC, if they can be cascaded properly to government offices all over the country, should be a good first step. Throw in a much needed Congressional review on the proper public disclosure of SALNs and the establishment of a foolproof system for verifying the claims made in an SALN and we can be on our way to having a government that is run by honest people that the public can truly trust instead of people that we have to put up with because of their command of the letter of the law, technicalities, and their mastery of loopholes that allow them to stay in power much longer than they deserve.*