In many early societies, two men who wanted to seal a deep bond of loyalty to each other would cut themselves (often on the hand or forearm) and mingle their blood, sometimes by pressing the wounds together or letting their blood drip into a shared cup and drinking it.

The belief was that sharing their blood made them “kin” in a spiritual sense, no longer just friends but blood brothers.

In the Philippines, some groups practiced blood brother rituals as variants of the Sandugo of Bohol in 1565 between Datu Sikatuna and Miguel López de Legazpi where they mixed their blood with wine and drank it to seal their friendship and brotherhood.

Fast forward to today, as revealed by Senate Pro Tempore Senator Panfilo Lacson in his privilege speech on 9 September, that there was a decades-long conspiracy between contractors, the DPWH and other state agencies to steal money through “fixed” contracts for real and ghost flood control projects nationwide.

Lacson exposed in great dramatic detail a flawless narrative of facts and a well-researched investigation on the wasted P1 trillion in infrastructure projects under compacts that were sealed not in blood, but in crisp, crackling banknotes.

He figuratively and literally opened the proverbial Pandora’s box and PBBM followed through by creating the Independent Commission for Infrastructure or ICI.

After Senator Lacson and DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon filed criminal cases and requested AMLC to freeze 133 bank accounts of the rogue project builders and their cohorts, the nation could be confident this would be the start of a total cleanup of the stable of corrupt, conscienceless, and conniving contractors, DPWH officials, and the insertion gangsters in the upper and lower houses of Congress.

Half of the ICI work has been done by newly appointed DPWH Secretary Dizon when he ordered the voluntary resignation of the implicated officials, the termination of clearly guilty district engineers, the personal inspection of flood projects—both real and ghost—the filing of charges in the Ombudsman, and the perpetual blacklisting of the identified corrupt contractors.

Perhaps if he had not done so yet, he should also order a root-and-branch overhaul of DPWH’s bidding, awarding, and payment systems.

Various civil society groups have staged public indignation rallies in key cities and flooded the traditional and digital platforms to ventilate their righteous anger, with some crossing the boundaries of what is legally permitted outpouring of fury.

All eyes are on the ICI and the courts, with the people expecting swift reclusion perpetua for the guilty and the confiscation of their stolen riches.

All justice and security arms of the government must be mobilized to deliver swift closure to this heinous scandal and guarantee the safety of the protesters and the ICI team.

The Sandugo once symbolized loyalty, honor, and brotherhood. Today’s “flood compact” is the dark inversion, a pact of betrayal that bleeds the nation’s coffers and drowns the people in corruption.

We fully support the work of the ICI in dismantling the vast network of deceit in order to reclaim the very meaning of a compact—from one that enriches the few at the expense of the many to one that restores faith in governance and binds the nation once more in justice, integrity, and hope.