Cardinal calls Filipino officials to repent at anti-corruption protest

Holding his brown wooden crozier, Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David delivered a 16-minute message to thousands of protesters at the People Power Monument rally, dubbed the Trillion Peso March.

Catholic and Protestant churches led anti-corruption protests in different parts of the Philippines on Sunday, as public anger rose over a corruption scandal involving billions of pesos in flood control projects.

The Bishop of Kalookan Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David, outgoing president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, surprised even the organisers by attending the biggest of these rallies at the People Power Monument in northern Metro Manila. 

Organisers said over 70,000 Filipinos attended the rally at the monument, which was built to commemorate the Church-backed People Power Revolution that ousted the late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos in 1986.

The date of the nationwide protests was emblematic because 21 September was also the fifty-third anniversary of the declaration of martial law under the Marcos regime. The incumbent president Ferdinand Marcos Jr is the late dictator’s son. 

Holding his brown wooden crozier, Cardinal David delivered a 16-minute message at the People Power Monument rally, which was called the Trillion Peso March.

David said liturgists might be scandalised at the way he used his baculo or crozier outside a liturgical setting. He pointed out, however, that it is a shepherd’s staff to save endangered sheep.

“Many of our countrymen have fallen into the pits of corruption. They can still repent,” he said. “Because this is a baculo, this can also be used to hit forest dogs and crocodiles who squander the people’s money.”

The protesters, wearing white as a symbol of hope, cheered for David while many of them held up crucifixes and images of the Virgin Mary.

The 66-year-old cardinal, known for defending victims of the former president Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs, offered the Church’s protection for whistleblowers. “We will open our churches as a sanctuary for those who have the courage to tell the truth,” he said.

“My brothers and sisters, corruption is not only about money that was stolen. It is also about a future that is being stolen until now,” said David. “That is why we are calling on lawmakers: Let us not turn the Senate and the House into a den of thieves!”

Churches mounted similar gatherings in other parts of the country. In the Archdiocese of Lingayen-Dagupan, led by the Archbishop Socrates Villegas, Catholics lit candles at 6 p.m. to symbolise their fight against corruption. 

The Church Leaders Council for National Transformation, which organised the Trillion Peso March, released a statement calling the rally “a profound work of Divine Providence”. The Bishop of Kidapawan Jose Colin Bagaforo, lead convenor of the group, said they mounted the rally with only 11 days of preparation and without funds at the start.

Bagaforo thanked David for “his inspiring surprise visit” along with his flock from the Diocese of Kalookan. “This miracle has only just begun,” Bagaforo said.

The 68-year-old President Marcos exposed the corruption controversy over flood control projects in mid-August, triggering congressional investigations. Supporters of both Marcos and Vice President Sara Duterte, the president’s erstwhile ally, have been implicated in the corruption scandal.

The Department of Finance said flood control anomalies cost the country’s economy up to P118.5 billion (£1.5 billion) in the last two years alone. Marcos recently formed an independent body to investigate flood control corruption over the past decade. 

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