Philippines: Time to end 'tongpats', 'balato', protect whistleblowers — and a radical change in public works
Ghost projects, cartels and kickbacks reveal systemic rot in public works spending
Manila: The Philippines has long grappled with suffocating, systemic graft.
The rot of institutionalised betrayal of public trust represents a deep-rooted, chronic crisis of culture.
The most nauseating evidence?
The Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) ex-Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo, who pledged to "return" ₱1 billion in kickbacks, as part of his "restitution" in becoming a state-witness.
But how can a DPWH official take such a staggering amount of Filipino taxpayers' money into his private kitty, while the people for which the money was meant to protect drowned in floodwaters?
It's just the tip of the iceberg.
It begs a blistering question: how on earth does a single public official siphon a staggering billion pesos of taxpayer wealth into his own private coffers, all while the very citizens that funding was meant to protect were left to drown in catastrophic floodwaters?
ORIGINS: Based on 2025 reports, corruption in the Philippines is estimated to drain approximately ₱700 billion to over ₱1 trillion ($16.2 billion) annually. This represents roughly 20% of the national budget being lost to graft, inflated contracts, and "ghost" projects. [Source: Grant Thornton]
Amid the deeply rooted "tongpats" culture, and without a system to protect whistleblowers, such an offence will only be repeated.
Bernardo’s billion-peso admission is a damning indictment of a system where infrastructure budgets are routinely treated as personal piggy banks, siphoning away the nation’s future to line private pockets.
Budget insertions, procurement loopholes, ghost/substandard projects
"Pork barrel" funds are slipped in via bicameral conferences or secret "small committees" in Congress, bypassing scrutiny.
Politicians "download" projects to districts, demanding kickbacks upfront. This is known as "tongpats" or "SOP" (standard operating procedure).
Early bidding favours insiders.
DPWH: Flood control projects at the DPWH enable corruption through massive budgets, opaque procurement, and political insertions, turning disaster resilience into a graft conduit. Based on 2025 reports, over ₱1.14 trillion ($20.6 billion) in funds allocated for flood control over the past 15 years is suspected to have been lost to corruption [Source: Senator Panfilo Lacson]
Contractors pay 10-30% kickbacks to officials before awards, with threats of delays or termination for non-payment.
Projects listed as complete are missing or fake (e.g., Bulacan and Mindoro fraud); overpricing, altered designs (e.g., boulevards instead of flood walls), and subpar materials like shallow sheet piles enable payouts without delivery.
Transparency International's 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) ranks the Asian country 120th out of 182 with a score of 32/100 -- a marked decline from 33 in 2024, signaling worsening perceptions amid scandals like flood projects.
The World Bank's "Worldwide Governance" Indicators report a 32.55% percentile rank for control of corruption in 2023, placing the Philippines below global averages and highlighting elite capture in state processes.
Recent DPWH scandal
State witness and DPWH ex-Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo testified last year that he personally delivered ₱250 million worth of "commitment fee" for flood control "deals" or portion of the payment for government projects to former senator Ramon Bong Revilla, Jr.
Testifying in court on April 24, 2026, he reiterated the same allegations.
Bernardo has already returned over ₱290 million, with ₱611 million recovered overall by the DOJ.
Hundreds of billions of pesos are lost to "ghost projects", turning climate resilience funds into a "proxy pork barrel."
This mirrors patterns in a 2026 study on flood control governance, linking DPWH district weaknesses — like procurement manipulation — to overpricing and non-completion.
Evidence from studies
Three key studies quantify the damage.
First, the 2025 CPI notes 86% of Filipinos view government corruption as a major issue, with 19% paying bribes for services, tying graft to climate fund misuse.
Second, a Center for Integrative and Development Studies analysis (2025) details how flood budgets ballooned to ₱545 billion, enabling contractors to corner billions via political ties.
Third, the World Bank's 2023 indicators confirm low corruption control, associating it with governance failures in infrastructure.
RISE IN DPWH FLOOD CONTROL FUNDING: The most significant driver of the budget surge is the explosive growth in flood management projects. From less than ₱100 billion in 2020, flood control allocations tripled to over ₱300 billion by 2025, comprising about one-third of the total infrastructure budget.
Need for Whistleblower Protection Law
To combat deep-seated corruption, the Philippines urgently needs a robust whistleblower protection law.
Any country with aspirations to truly uplift the people should encourage insiders to report wrongdoing without fear of retaliation.
This would boost the rule of law. By protecting whistleblowers from harassment, dismissal, and safety threats, this is a crucial legislation to ensure accountability and transparency in public service.
Here are four key reasons why this legislation is needed:
Effective corruption prosecution: A dedicated law is necessary to uncover fraud and graft, as current anti-corruption measures often lack specific protections for those exposing irregularities.
Protection against intense retaliation: Potential whistleblowers face significant risks, including harassment, losing their jobs, and threats to their personal safety. A law would guarantee anonymity and security.
Fostering accountability and transparency: It promotes ethical practices within organizations and government, enabling honest employees to speak up, as highlighted by the Governance Commission for GOCC's updated policies.
Strengthening public trust: By providing legal, financial and — most importantly — safety support, institutions will be strengthened, reducing the culture of impunity that protects the powerful.
2025 BUDGET SURGE: In 2025, the DPWH budget soared to over ₱1 trillion, a historic high, following extensive revisions in the bicameral conference committee.
Enabling factors
In the Philippines, the fixed so-called "administrative deductions" (2-3.5% per level) institutionalise skimming.
In the flood-control construction business, 15 firms dominated contracts, indicating cartels. COA audits and Senate probes reveal DPWH district engineers and regional directors as key enablers.
All told: Based on 2025 reports, over ₱1.14 trillion ($20.6 billion) in funds allocated for flood control over the past 15 years, as per Senator Ping Lacson.
LEGISLATIVE INSERTIONS & PORT BARREL: The budget increases were largely attributed to additions made by lawmakers during the budget process (insertions). Reports suggest that in 2025, up to ₱783 billion in project insertions required special funding releases, with many projects deemed questionable or "pork barrel" items.
₱1 billion restitution
Bernardo is just one conscience-stricken official who showed willingness to return ₱1 billion in kickbacks from flood-control projects.
Former DPWH Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo, acting as a state witness, revealed a massive corruption scheme involving "tongpats" or "balato" (kickback) payments from flood control projects.
Bernardo implicated several lawmakers and officials.
For example, he confessed to delivering over P500 million in kickbacks to former senator Bong Revilla between 2024 and 2025.
2026 BUDGET PIVOT: Due to intense scrutiny and findings of high corruption risks in 2025, the proposed 2026 budget for DPWH was slashed, resulting in the removal of all locally funded, non-foreign-assisted flood control projects.
Among Bernardo's key revelations:
"Balato" scheme: Confessed to facilitating kickbacks where 20%-25% of project costs were given to lawmakers, naming it a "'balato' scheme".
Lawmakers involved: Implicated former senator Bong Revilla (P500M+ in kickbacks), former senator Nancy Binay (₱37M), and Senator Chiz Escudero (allegedly ₱160M through an associate).
Cash deliveries: Claimed personal delivery of cash in boxes to Revilla's Cavite home with staff.
Role admission: Admitted involvement in the anomalous projects, specifically mentioning a P289.4 million project linked to Sunwest, linked to resigned congressman Zaldy Co (arrested in Europe).
Restitution: Admitted to returning nearly half a billion pesos and committed to returning a total of P1 billion to the government.
This is a revolting reality: Surely, those who plunder the Filipino people's taxes should be meted with the maximum penalty.
Under Philippine law, RA No. 7080 (the Anti-Plunder Act), as amended, the penalty for plunder (totaling at least ₱50 million, through a combination or series of overt or criminal acts) in the Philippines is reclusion perpetua (life imprisonment) to death.
Time for change
It's not isolated but a symptom of unchecked patronage.
Politicians and bureaucrats treat public money as personal ATMs, dooming Filipinos to floods while enriching cronies.
True change requires independent audits, digital procurement, lifetime bans for grafters, and CPI-driven accountability; otherwise, the archipelago sinks under corruption's weight.
This multi-billion-peso betrayal demands outrage, not apathy. And the full force of the law.
As long as the poisonous "tongpats" culture — where kickbacks are baked into every project — remains the gold standard of governance, and as long as the country refuses to enact ironclad protections for whistleblowers, this cycle of theft will continue unabated.
The money vanishes, the infrastructure crumbles, and the cycle of corruption repeats itself.
It's a relentless tragedy that feeds on the blood and sweat of the Filipino people.
The change has to come from within; only then would things really change for the better for people crying out for it.
