A final challenge facing the Council is that posed by organizations pursuing criminal, violent or terrorist agendas. In fact, an early issue that confronted PCNC was the fear in some quarters that the Council might be used to attach a veneer of legitimacy to bogus NGOs that, by virtue of political connections, could exert great pressure for certification. During the 2000 impeachment hearings against then President Joseph Estrada, a representative of an organi- zation he apparently founded for money-laundering purposes claimed that it had received PCNC certification. When the Council clarified that this was not the case, that the Erap (Estrada’s nickname) Muslim Youth Foundation had not pursued an application and therefore had not been approved, it may well have bolstered PCNC’s ongoing credibility.
In a related but even more dire vein, the international backdrop against which the Council today operates is a post-9/11 world concerned about the flow of funds for terrorism and the possibility that NGOs can facilitate that flow. This is salient in the Philippines, where there has been a small but threat- ening presence of individuals and groups with links to international terrorism networks. In addition, while the communist insurgency is far weaker than in its heyday of the late 1980s, it continues to operate partly through front organizations. In recognition of these realities, the first issue that PCNC President Victoria Gartchitorena highlights in her homepage statement on the PCNC website is how ‘global terrorism has heightened the need for controls in the flows of funds in order to block the monetary lifelines of extremist groups’.8
It is unlikely that organizations engaging in terrorism or other forms of violence would seek certification. But if they did, PCNC would not necessarily determine their true nature. It is not an intelligence operation or a detective agency. Nevertheless, a potential issue for PCNC is the threat of having its credibility damaged if it mistakenly certifies a group linked to criminal or terrorist activity. There is no guarantee that such a group could not slip through the cracks of an evaluation process concerned with more mundane matters. This does not necessarily reflect poorly on PCNC, for its process can never be perfect. But it might want to portray any anti-terrorism role more modestly, rather than emphasizing that function, to avoid raising expectations about its contribution to such an effort.
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OTES1 This chapter draws on document and website reviews and on interviews with Philippine NGO leaders, funding agency personnel and Council Executive Director Felicidad Soledad, to whom the author wishes to express particular appreciation.
The author welcomes comments. They may be sent to him at [email protected].
2 Philippine tax law’s distinction between NGOs and other non-stock, non-profit organizations is a technical one of little relevance to this discussion of NGO accountability. It nevertheless should be noted because, despite its name, the Philippine Council for NGO Certification is authorized to certify not just NGOs, but also organizations falling within that latter, broader category (of which NGOs are a subset) (see BIR 13-98, Section 1(d)). Thus, while PCNC informally refers to all certified organizations as NGOs, other terms also apply to many of them. In addition to social welfare and development organizations, its list of certified organizations includes universities, other educational institutions, grant-making foundations, NGO networks and religious institutions. See List of Certified NGOs, www.pcnc.com.ph. Except in a few ways that such other organizations potentially pertain to the work of PCNC and NGO accountability, this chapter does not focus on them.
3 For further background on the PCNC, see Chamberlain, R. A. ‘Regulating Civil Society’, www.pcnc.com.ph.
4 In practical terms, however, the tax deduction is less likely to affect and influence salaried individuals whose taxes are taken out of their regular paychecks, as opposed to more affluent or self-employed persons who can more easily claim the deduction when filing their tax returns.
5 ‘Certification of Non-Stock, Non-Profit Corporations and Non-Government Organizations for Donee Institution Status: A Primer’, www.pcnc.com.ph.
6 More specifically, although the matter needs to be clarified, this does not seem to include cooperatives and ‘people’s organizations’, grassroots membership associa- tions that many NGOs serve and with which they partner. Often known in other countries as community-based organizations (although in the Philippines people’s organizations also can include unions and other groups that are not literally community-based), some people’s organizations are relatively informal associa- tions that do not necessarily have or seek formal status.
7 Interview with author, Manila, 28 May 2004.
8 On the Occasion of PCNC’s 4th Annual Assembly, ‘A Message from the President’, www.pcnc.com.ph.
The Donor Accountability Agenda
Jem Bendell and Phyllida Cox
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NTRODUCTIONDonors have the power to influence whether NGOs have the resources to do their work and how they can do it. Given the crucial role that donors play in shaping the NGO landscape, no consideration of NGO accountability would be complete without consideration of the accountability of the donors themselves. In this chapter we set out a new way of looking at donor account- ability that places this issue within the context of achieving more democratically accountable decision-making in society as a whole. We put forth democratic accountability as an aspirational dimension to debates and initiatives on NGO accountability.
After describing some of the accountability issues arising from current donor practice, we outline four broad principles for a ‘democratically account- able donor practice’ that address how a donor generates funds, administers itself, disperses funds and influences other donors. For each of these areas of activity, donors should be clear about their purpose, seek greater transparency, identify their stakeholders and engage them, and create support mechanisms for complaints and enforcement. Given the diversity among donors, our discus- sion is fairly general and introductory, with further work on conceptual, practical and political levels required to develop and implement the agenda.