IloiloUpClose

Augusto “Boboy” Syjuco, director general of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) and two-term congressman of the 2nd district of Iloilo, is literally a man standing on a half-open scaffolding with a thick rope around his neck, just awaiting the final push from the executioner for him to fall from the platform and hanged for his crimes against the people.

That’s because the Office of the President has upheld the charges of grave misconduct against Syjuco’s minions at the TESDA who manipulated the bidding procedures and award a hefty P9.2 million printing contract to a favored supplier sometime in August 2006 and pronounced them “guilty” as charged.

In a 20-page decision, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said the administrative charges filed by the Presidential Anti-Graft Commission (PAGC) show there were irregularities in the transaction, and Syjuco, as the director general, could have prevented the anomalous contract from being awarded by simply not signing it. But Syjuco signed the deal, for after all, it was carried out in accordance with his order.

The sad thing is that the executioner’s axe lopped off the heads of Syjuco’s co-respondents in the case — all members of the TESDA Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) — for they were ordered dismissed from the service with total loss of eligibility and blocked from being re-employed in the government. That’s their reward for blindly obeying Syjuco’s orders.

Syjuco got off the hook, momentarily, because he holds Cabinet rank, and the Office of the President chose a more prudent path of endorsing his case to the Committee of Peers composed of fellow Cabinet members, for the disposition of the charges against him.

It should be highlighted that the anomalous transaction took place at the instance of Syjuco. The BAC members only allowed themselves to put their stamp of approval on an obviously illegal transaction that violated the government procurement procedures. If the soldiers were meted the penalty of dismissal, it only shows that their general is all the more guilty, and deserves a harsher penalty.

This should serve as warning to other officials of the TESDA not to allow themselves to be used as tools for Syjuco’s glaring corrupt activities. Millions and millions of pesos intended for the vocational training of Filipino youth have been siphoned off to his private bank accounts through his foundations and cooperatives.

Syjuco is edging closer to the precipice. It won’t take long before Malacanang realizes the magnitude of his corruption and dismiss him from his position as director general.