DAPAT TAPAT MOVEMENT
under the joint
Program for Integrity and People Empowerment (PIPE)
of Transparency International – Philippines
(TI-Phils)
& Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG
DAPAT
TAPAT is a movement against corruption.
It
stands for integrity –honesty in the highest ethical standards
especially in public service—and conscious participation of
people in decision making and implementation of programs that affect
them.
It
promotes the basic tenets of
- TRANSPARENCY
- ACCOUNTABILITY
- PARTICIPATION
OF PEOPLE
in governance
It
believes that the war on corruption being waged in the Philippines
is older than the oldest Filipino alive today.
It was one of the cancers that Jose Rizal sought to lay bare before
the temple in his novel Noli Me Tangere. Most attempts to build
on the literary tradition that Rizal started would always feature
corruption as among the main ills of Philippine society.
Corruption is as familiar to Filipinos as the policeman on the street
who allows vehicles to park where they should not in exchange for
a daily fee, or the government clerk who would put the papers of
a bribe-giver on top of those for the signature of the next official.
The more complex deals involving millions or even billions, Filipinos
only get to hear about when the media discover and expose them.
Countless studies and surveys say corruption is rampant, widespread
and in a worsening state in the Philippines:
- The 2005-2006
PERC reports that the Philippines is second only to the most
corrupt country in Asia, Bangladesh;
- Transparency
International’s (TI) Corruption Perception Index reveals
that the Philippines’ ranking has steadily worsened reaching
an all-time high of 117 in 2005 from 102 in 2004
- The mid-March
2006 Report by Pacific Strategies and Assessments (PSA) a leading
Asia-based business risk consultancy firm claims that a weak
rule of law and rampant corruption continue to make the Philippines
Asia's top kidnapping spot.
- The Social
Weather Station (SWS) surveys claim that in 2005 most Filipino
entrepreneurs still perceived corruption as a major problem
- The 2006
“Year of Great Trials” Annual Survey Review asserts
that consistent areas of public dissatisfaction remain about
the Philippine President and corruption.
Waging
the war against corruption
The
war on corruption has taken and is still taking various forms,
attacking at various aspects of the problem.
Campaigns
against corrupt public officials have led to electoral defeats
and even popular uprisings. But the fact that corruption remains
a festering cancer in Philippine society proves that the problem
is of a systemic nature.
Only by looking to solutions that go beyond personalities can
there be a real possibility of winning the war against corruption.
What
DTM is doing and can do
DTM’s
main thrust is in education, training and research towards awareness
and capability building on ethics and issues of governance especially
the issue of corruption.
DTM believes that a cultural transformation is necessary to counter
the prevailing decadent culture of greed and abuse of position.
- Transformation
starts from a change in basic outlook at corruption
- Social
character of corruption
- Social
character of change
DTM
pushes for individual and community participation in instituting
change. When the individual and community are aware of the sources
and roots of why there is corruption, they become active movers
and propagators for change in their own homes, work places, community
and in the larger society.
DTM
believes that this should start NOW from cradle to adulthood and
among communities, schools, work places and public offices.
Therefore, DTM is synergistic and links up with schools, government
institutions, private offices, factories, NGOs and other groups
DTM
conducts
- Research
- Education
and trainings on Ethics and Corruption
- DapatTapat
Awards
- TV-radio
production and other educational materials like VCDs and TV
plugs, documentaries
- Publications
like Manuals, Monographs, Books
- Awareness
promotional materials like stickers, stand up traffic signs,
posters, pins, T-shirts, flags, caps and the like to help instill
awareness
- Special
awareness drives like campus tours, essay writing and poster
making contests
Email
address: dapattapatmovement@yahoo.com or tvpipe05@yahoo.com
Telefax: (+632-9299526)
The
Proponents
Two
institutions, the Philippine chapter of Transparency International
(TI-Philippines) and the Center
for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), have joined
forces under the Program for Integrity and People Empowerment
(PIPE) to initiate DAPAT TAPAT Movement in an effort to win the
war against corruption through values and ethics-based cultural
transformation and policy change.
TI-Philippines,
established on Aug. 26, 1995, is one of the over 120 national
chapters of TI, the global coalition against corruption. TI is
a non-profit, politically non-partisan, non-governmental organization
dedicated to increasing government accountability and curbing
both international and national corruption. Its Berlin-based head
office released its Corruption Perception Index and Global Barometer
on Corruption last year placing the Philippines high on the list
of corrupt countries.
CenPEG is a public
policy center set up shortly before the May 2004 elections to
help promote people empowerment in governance and democratic representation
of the marginalized poor in an elitist and patronage-driven electoral
and political system. It conducts research/policy study, education
and trainings on governance and people empowerment. To pursue
its programs in research and education-training, CenPEG taps a
wide pool of political analysts, public policy experts and academic
scholars for their expertise and experience in public governance
as well as in grassroots empowerment
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