When the window of opportunity open(s), that’s when you work twice as hard. – Wolf of Wall Street

If it is injurious, the State should be furious.

But more than that, it should spring into corrective action in a snap.

A recurring but fundamentally unlawful act in not one but a handful of key agencies is a compelling motive for drastic and dramatic government intervention.

When the fallout of such serial malfeasance is so intense and vast as to be inimical to the national interest, the greater should be the compulsion for government to stop it on its tracks.

And so Ped Xing cannot understand the intolerable timidity, the complete, utterly unacceptable indifference or reluctance of concerned agencies in the face of established and continuing breach of the basic law of the land.

The forbidden acts have not only been uncovered; they have been admitted by the officials directly involved themselves.

What else can they do? They have been caught in the act and owned up to it.

And yet, quite disappointingly and outrageously, only half of an independent branch of government is doing all the work to address the probem.

Lawmakers warned the government against the grant-for-policy tactics employed by some foreign private organizations, saying they represent a direct violation of the Constitution and assault on national sovereignty.

Acting on the resolution of Deputy Speaker Deogracias Victor Savellano, the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability launched a congressional probe on March 16 on the Food and Drug Administration’s admission of receiving grants from foreign anti-tobacco group, where Rep. Jericho Nograles exposed the pattern of government agencies’ issuance of local regulations following the receipt of foreign money.

“The bigger issue here is do we allow government agencies to be influenced by monies coming from foreign private organizations? What we are looking at here is a constitutional violation, an attack on the sovereignty of the Republic of the Philippines, our independence itself. That is the big problem,” Nograles said.

He said the issue is not only about the FDA, noting that several government agencies have received a total of $2.5 million from The Union, a private charity funded by the anti-tobacco advocacy Bloomberg Initiative.

He recalled that in 2009, the Department of Health received $742,441 for the development and enforcement of local government smoke-free ordinances; the following year, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority received $206,701 for the same purpose.

In 2010, the DoH received $369,877 for tobacco-control policies, the same year the Civil Service Commission and DoH Joint Memorandum Circular 2010-01 was issued.

“I believe that this JMC is also unconstitutional,” Nograles said.

In 2012, the lawmaker continued, the MMDA again received $180,000 for smoke-free city ordinances.

The following year the DoH got $150,000 for the implementation of tobacco- control policies, and the CSC was handed $150,000 to raise awareness of and compliance with the policy to exclude tobacco industry interference.

In 2014, the DoH was again endowed $192,000 for the National Tobacco Control Strategy.

In 2015, the DepEd took in $158,039 for its tobacco advertising ban campaign.

A year later the CSC was in receipt of $183,695 while the MMDA drew down another $160,000, he said.

“We cannot treat this as mere coincidence because this happened in [the course of several] years,” Nograles said.

Under Republic Act 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and Republic Act 6713 or the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees, the FDA is not allowed to hire personnel in behalf of The Union, said Nograles.

“The FDA said that it does not in any way act as an agent of The Union. I agree, but suddenly you are hiring personnel in behalf of The Union. The FDA said that The Union is not a client registering a product. That is correct, but The Union can be influential in blocking the registration of a product,” he said.

Meanwhile, Savellano said he initiated the congressional probe to get to the bottom of the foreign funding of agencies in return for preferred policies.

“I called for this investigation to find out the truth. Did the FDA issue specific and pre-defined policies on e-cigarettes and HTPs (heated tobacco products) in exchange for funding from foreign private organizations?” Savellano said.

“Is this the reason why the FDA in its one-sided and less-than-transparent virtual public hearing could not give the public a real opportunity to flesh out important provisions and requirements for the regulation of e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products?” he added.

“The FDA has conducted multiple researches and consultations with different groups, and these groups they consulted with are also funded by The Union and Bloomberg Initiative. There have been multiple instances wherein every time there is an anti-tobacco regulation that comes out of either the FDA or DoH, it coincides with grants coming from Bloomberg,” the lawmaker noted.

He cited the statement of FDA Director Anna Rivera during the hearing in which she confirmed that the agency hired multiple job orders in behalf of The Union and granted different salary grades to these personnel.

“This is the problem. The FDA has received money from a private organization that is opposed to a legitimate industry in the country, and that money was utilized to hire persons as job orders and given salary grades under our laws to conduct anti-tobacco projects,” he said.

A representative of a tobacco-producing province that depends heavily on the local tobacco industry, Savellano criticized the FDA for drafting proposed guidelines on e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products that were even more restrictive than regulations for combustible cigarettes, which his constituents have decried as a de facto ban on these alternative nicotine products.

“As government officials, we are expected to be fair, objective and transparent in issuing and implementing public policies. We hope that through this investigation, we can better protect our independence and sovereignty so that we do not become an easy target for foreign private entities that wish to interfere with our national policies,” Savellano said.

“I understand that the FDA is only doing their job; we are not out to lynch the FDA and other government agencies,” said Nograles. “We want a healthier country, but at the same time we also want our laws to be followed.”

To be sure, these noble goals are not mutually exclusive.

Behold God’s glory and seek His mercy.

Pause and pray, people.