Political Journal Report
Philippines’ ‘Pork Barrel’ Graft Probe Has Lawmakers Squealing
by Charlie Campbell, September 11th, 2013
Summary
A "Pork Barrel" is a nickname for the Priority Development Assistance Funds. These funds are over 4.5 million and 1.6 million dollars sent to the Philippines's senators and congressmen. They're supposed to use this money to pay for "local infrastructure and development works. However, much of this cash is simply ferreted away through bogus NGOs and nonsensical initiatives." The money is also sent towards getting re elected. About 80% of the country are in poverty, and there are people at the top misusing government money. New reforms include the same amount of money being used by these people, but now they have to show exactly what it's going towards.
Thoughts
That's really not nice, what they're doing. Especially if a lot of the people in the Philippines are poor, as the article suggested. When I clicked on the article I thought it would be about actual pork but this was more interesting. I'm glad that their Freedom of Information Act is pulling through.
Tying Into the Philippines's Political Life
The article mentioned that no dengue-fever vaccine is available. If the majority of the Philippines's people are making less and less money, and the people who are getting the government money aren't using it properly, a variety of things could go wrong, like their vaccines not being available (which could lead to death), or since the money was originally supposed to go to local infrastructure and development works, those would lack as well. This kind of spending might offend the public people, and cause them to distrust their leaders.