Iloilo is ‘bird’s nest of corruption’ — Ex provincial admin

Sen. Franklin Drilon delivers his speech at the Wallace Business Forum in 2013. Photo by Joseph Vidal/PRIB via Drilon’s Facebook page.

MANILA — Iloilo City is the country’s nest of corruption according to former Iloilo provincial administrator Manuel Mejorada on Thursday.

Mejorada added that the allegedly overpriced Iloilo Convention Center (ICC) is ‘just the tip pf the iceberg’ in a city protected by the Senate President Franklin Drilon.

“It pains me to tell the whole nation that Iloilo City has become the bird’s nest of corruption in the country. And it’s largely because those behind such corruption enjoy a mantle of protection from the third highest elected official of the land,” Mejorada said in his opening statement.

The statement was made during the first Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on the P747-million ICC.

He enumerated several infrastructure projects that he claims to have anomalies.

Aside from the Convention Center, he cited the Pavia housing project, the Iloilo diversion road, the Esplanade project funded by Disbursement Acceleration Program, the San Isidro relocation site land purchases, the Iloilo City Hall of Justice and two flyovers under the President’s Bridge Program, among others.

Mejorda is claiming that Drilon pocketed public funds as kickbacks from the construction of the ICC which was funded by Drilon’s pork barrel funds and the Disbursement Acceleration Program.