Starving the watchdog

We love the theater of accountability. Whenever a flood control project goes underwater or a vice president faces impeachment over confidential funds, politicians trip over themselves to champion transparency. But if you want to know how much a government actually cares about fighting corruption, ignore the press conferences. Look at the ledger.

Right now, the Commission on Audit (COA) is bleeding out. They are short 384 state auditors. At a moment when the public purse is hemorrhaging billions to dubious contracts, the very people tasked with tracking our money are fighting with one hand tied behind their backs.

This is a clear case of inherited sabotage. We are still living with the ghost of the Duterte administration. In 2020, former President Rodrigo Duterte, who openly had a strained relationship with COA and called on them to stop publishing its audit reports, oversaw the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) slashing 716 auditor positions. It was a surgical strike against transparency. Slashing their manpower wasn’t a glitch; it was a feature. Six years later, in July 2025, the DBM finally approved restoring 332 roles.

Half measures do not catch full-time crooks. We are still missing 384 sworn state auditors. You have to ask whether the current administration is genuinely trying to rebuild COA’s capacity, or quietly enjoying the benefits of a weakened watchdog.

The budget spells out the hypocrisy. For 2027, COA asked for PHP 16.05 billion. The DBM recommended trimming it to PHP 14.77 billion. As Akbayan Rep. Perci Cendeña rightly pointed out, you cannot claim anti-corruption is a priority while starving the agency meant to enforce it. COA Chairperson Gamaliel Cordoba says they need a mere PHP 2.5 billion to establish 146 additional pre-audit teams. Refusing to fund the accountants who look for graft is not cost-saving. It is a massive, blinking green light for corruption that will ultimately cost taxpayers far more than PHP 2.5 billion.

But DBM cuts are only half the crisis. The frontlines are suffering a massive brain drain. COA is losing its best talent to the private sector. Auditing complex government projects requires sharp, top-tier financial minds. If the civil service cannot offer competitive salaries or flexible work setups, private firms will relentlessly poach the very professionals meant to guard our money. You cannot expect highly trained accountants to take a vow of poverty to protect a government that refuses to protect them. Modernizing compensation for critical oversight roles is not optional — it is a baseline necessity.

To plug the holes, COA is getting desperate. They are leaning heavily on data analytics and tapping the Citizen Participatory Audit program to bring civil society into the fold. Opening audits to the public is a massive win for democracy. But let’s be brutally honest — well-meaning citizen volunteers cannot legally or structurally replace 384 seasoned state auditors. A laptop and a civic-minded volunteer are not a substitute for institutional muscle. Technology and public help should enhance a fully staffed COA, not act as a desperate band-aid for systemic defunding.

We get the transparency we are willing to pay for. If we refuse to pay the auditors, we will inevitably end up paying the thieves.