DAVAO City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte along with Davao City Councilor Nilo "Small" Abellera Jr. were recently in the news after being implicated by Senator Antonio Trillanes IV to smuggling at the Davao Port.
The Davao City councilors downplayed the allegations saying whatever the two were involved in are in their personal capacities and will not affect the integrity of the Davao City Council.
That is where the city council erred.
While we know that Trillanes has the penchant of throwing unfounded accusations to any enemy of the party, as Dabawenyos, we have to look out for our own.
Meaning, whatever accusations is pitched our way, these should be answered in all honesty by the accused. That is the kind of integrity that we must demand from our city officials.
Of course, that is because we believe they are not hiding anything. If they are, then that is another story, and would demand an even greater call to come out clean.
We have enjoyed a local government that may still have corrupt officials who are not above asking for money by simply not attending to pressing concerns of the public, like maybe documents. The corrupt are still there, masked by the uprightness of the top leaders, but they are still there. But, we can say, they are the minority and they are not as greedy.
It's bad though that we tolerate them, worse because we'd rather not mind them, content with the fact that they are just a few. We shouldn't because it is in tolerating the corrupt few where seeds of corruption grow.
Meaning, if they are our city officials, then they should step forward and say: We are clean and we can prove it. That is the standard that Dabawenyos should demand.