According to a group of Filipino-Chinese businessmen (Anvil Business Club), President Benigno S. Aquino III ranks alongside Singapore’s first Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, as incorruptible, writes The Royal Danish in Kuala Lumpur on it’s website.
Corruption remains a serious threat to prosperity and development in countries all over the world. Aquino was elected as new president of the Philippines in May 2010 with the slogan of combating corruption and fighting poverty. Corruption has been very extensive under his predecessors, especially while Arroyo was reigning (2001-2010).
A 2010-report by the Transparency International (TI) showed that on a scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (very clean), the Philippines maintained a score of 2.4 in this year’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI).
It is most questionable if corruption will ever vanish completely. Aquino’s fight on corruption is an enormous task that will take many years to combat. And it is probably not something that will happen in his presidency, though this initial effort is of utmost importance.
Aquino’s effort to eliminate corruption as the rule of conduct in the political system in the Philippines is therefore even more admirable. A president labelled as incorruptible is inspiring in this effort, and gives high hopes that changes in the political structures in the Philippines can happen at last.
Aquino is likened to Lee Kuan Yew, the former Prime Minister of Singapore (1959-1990), who led his country from poverty to prosperity, as being “incorruptible.” Wilson Lee, one of the founders of the Anvil Business Club, said, that like famous leader Lee Kuan Yew who transformed Singapore into an economic superpower, Aquino could do the same to the Philippines, because the two leaders share several similarities.
Aquino also still enjoys the support of the Filipinos. In a just publicised survey on the public satisfaction with the government’s general performance, the rating result was “very good”, with a net satisfaction score of +64 (73-9). This survey was the first during Aquino’s presidency, and marked the reversal of a long run of negative net scores in former president Arroyo’s scores on public satisfaction.
