Wednesday, March 05, 2008 Editorial: Losers and losses at NFA
NOTHING could be more ridiculous in the collection of government clichés than which that runs to the effect that National Food Authority's (NFA) "losses are gains for rice farmers and consumers."
That is courtesy of NFA administrator Jessup Navarro, who had nothing redeemable to say when confronted with the food agency's P21.2 billion total losses as of 2006.
But then the public relented, since, as NFA officials say, these titanic losses were incurred on operational costs to subsidize the price of palay.
Enter the shameless grafters within the agency.
Rice stocks are being diverted, re-bagged, mislabeled, or mixed with commercial supplies. Worse, rice supplies are hoarded to create a favorable market condition that benefits the already privileged few.
The admission of a local rice trader that he was able to obtain stupendously excessive quantity of rice allocation provides only a sneak preview of the culture of incompetence and corruption inside the NFA office in Northern Mindanao.
Allegations and counter-allegations of groups who maintain pecuniary interests in rice trading show the extent of influence the unscrupulous traders wield inside the agency.
The picture of it all paints a top-to-bottom presence of petty to big-time grafters within NFA-Western Mindanao.
All forms of government corruption deprive the taxpayers of services due them. The corruption inside NFA deprives the poor of the food on their tables.
It is high time for NFA-10 to come clean and rid its ranks of bad apples by filing criminal and administrative cases against erring officials. Last we heard, a high-ranking official and at least two personnel who were initially found guilty of anomalous transactions were only reassigned.
We don't need this kind of wrist slapping, lest we send the wrong message that grafters have a place in the government-the government already chockfull of their kind.
This also serves a challenge for government audit agencies to keep an extra eye on NFA-the only government agency that carries the food basket where the poor can feed himself.
The impoverished majority should not be deprived of that basket.
