Bangladesh, Nov. 18 -- For the second time in just months, Manila has become the epicenter of a rising national fury-one fueled not by ideological divisions, but by the very real, deadly consequences of corruption. Over the weekend, hundreds of thousands of Filipinos poured into the capital to demand justice, accountability, and systemic reform after revelations that billions of pesos earmarked for flood-control projects were lost to graft, kickbacks, and what investigators now call an unprecedented series of “ghost” infrastructure schemes.

The scale of the protests is extraordinary, even by the Philippines history of mass mobilization. On November 17, as the sun rose over Quirino Grandstand, an estimated 150,000 people had a...