By TONY LOPEZ
By this time, the government should have ordered the arrest of three people—spouses Pacifico “Curlee” Discaya and Cezarah “Sarah” Discaya and Bicol party list Congressman Elizaldy “Zaldy” Co—for crime against the people.
According to Senate President Tempore Panfilo Lacson, over ten years, from 2016 to 2025, Curlee and Sarah Discaya bagged P207.25 billion worth of flood control and other infra contracts from the Department of Public Works and Highways. That’s 21% of the P1 trillion (1,000 billion pesos) stolen at DPWH in the last ten years. Twenty one pesos of every 100 pesos stolen at DPWH were stolen by the Discayas. Twenty-one million of every P100 million stolen at DPWH were stolen by the Discayas.
For his part, Zaldy Co grabbed in ten years P86 billion worth of DPWH contracts—per data of The Inquirer and the DPWH.
Zaldy’s play money from DPWH in the past ten years: P1.961 billion in 2016; P1.322 billion in 2017; P8.187 billion in 2018; P4.871 billion in 2019; P3.750 billion in 2020; P4.365 billion in 2021; P16.906 billion in 2022; P17.216 billion in 2023; P19.981 billion in 2024; and P7.512 billion in 2025.
Note that Co’s DPWH moolah increased exponentially in the last three years—P16.9 billion in 2022, P17.21 billion in 2023, and P19.98 billion in 2024, from only P2 billion per year in 2016. Those years were the height of his powers as a party list congressman (he was elected in 2019). House Speaker Martin Romualdez made him chair of the House Appropriations Committee—the committee that decides the national government budget. That appointment is like Dracula being made in charge of the blood bank. Or the bank robber being made the manager of the bank.
Since the thievery at DPWH has averaged at P1 billion per day or 1,000 million pesos daily, in the past three years, the Discayas are actually pocketing or stealing EVERY DAY, P210 million of taxpayers’ money, our money.
That is why Mrs. Discaya can afford to buy a Rolls Royce just because she likes the freebie umbrella that comes with it. It’s like the thrill of buying an umbrella with a freebie Rolls Royce. Can you imagine the high of buying an umbrella with a free Rolls Royce to boot? Wow. Nothing like it.
By year, the amounts that went to the Discayas are: P6.456 billion or 1.77% of the P364.8 billion DPWH capital outlay for 2016; P21.515 billion or 5% of P430.3 billion in 2017; P19.62 billion or 3.2% of P613.2 billion in 2018; P10 billion or 1.9% of P527.9 billion in P527.9 billion in 2019; P18.41 billion or 3.3% of P558 billion in 2020; P15.53 billion or 2.3% of P675.4 billion in 2021; P30.82 billion or 4% of P770.7 billion in 2022; P31.48 billion or 3.6% of P874.6 billion in 2023; P35.2 billion or 3.6% of P977,7 billion in 2024; and P17.44 billion or 1.6% of P1.09 trillion in 2025.
Total share of the Discayas in ten years of total DPWH infra spending, 2016-2025—P207 billion or 3.0% of P6.9 trillion. Imagine in a country of 115 million, only one family—Discaya—grabbed 3% (P207 billion) of the Philippines’ total P6.9 trillion infra spending over the last ten years.
How revolting or outrageous is that? No family in the Philippines, not even our ten richest Filipino billionaires, has been blest with so much free taxpayers’ money in so short a period of time, and by exerting so little, if any, effort.
No wonder, the Discayas strut like royalty. Curlee and Sarah Discaya can face any Senate or House investigation committee with remarkable calm and easygoing lying. They know they can BUY their way to freedom. There is even speculation they are not actually Filipino citizens, but British, although not (yet) British royalty. After all, Sarah was born in England to a Filipino mother who was a chambermaid and a Filipino father who was a waiter.
Why did the Discayas exert so little effort to make P207 billion? Well, the Discayas simply stole our money, thanks to their cohorts and co-conspirators inside the DPWH.
The crooks include the highest officials (cabinet-level chiefs of the DPWH), mid-level engineers (about 100 of them), and even the lowliest of its cashiers.
This explains why since mid-August this year when the flood control scandal or flood-gate swelled into public view, I have been advocating the abolition of the DPWH. The agency is rotten to the core. Sinking the entire DPWH apparatus and its men into the boiling fires of hell (dagat-dagatang apoy, to use the language of preachers) won’t cleanse DPWH of its congenital corruption.
By the way, did you know what the acronym DPWH now stands for? DITO PURO WALANG HIYA. (Here, everyone is shameless).
Even Vince Dizon, the new DPWH secretary, is shocked at the level of corruption and wrongdoing at the agency. Vince was not born yesterday. He has spent nearly three decades of his professional life in government service making money the old fashioned way—thru hard and honest work.
Dizon is suing the Discayas. The Justice department should be looking for Zaldy Co by now.