Corrections no; correctional yes!

Resigned Customs Commissioner John Sevilla said he relinquished his post because he failed to stop the rampant corruption in the agency. What he really wanted to say was that  he did not want to serve as an administration bagman in fund-raising for the 2016 elections.

Sevilla’s sin, if one can call it that, is one of omission. Sevilla himself had not been directly involved in any reported shenanigans at  Customs, unlike his deputy Jessie Dellosa whose men had been tagged in several extort complaints.

But Sevilla’s resignation is the exception to the rule because the norm is for thick-skinned government officials to cling on to their posts like leeches despite facing graft and plunder cases.

Aside from Dellosa, there’s Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala who hangs on as if he has not brought President Aquino enough shame and ignominy. The latest on Alcala is that his DA squandered P14.2 billion of taxpayers’ money on ghost projects.

Just the same, Alcala was correct when he said that the report of the Commission on Audit (COA), which blew the whistle on him, was some sort of a “guide.” But Alcala was wrong in thinking the COA report was a “guide” on how the anomalies can be corrected.

As in the many graft and corruption cases that elicited guilty verdicts from the Sandiganbayan, COA reports serve as a “guide” for the Ombudsman in prosecuting erring officials.

Nope, it’s already past the point of corrections for the plunder of public funds at DA. What the people want now is for government officials behind this latest case of plunder to spend their remaining years in our correctional facilities. -end-