ASEANEWS HEADLINE-COURTS & CRIME | MANILA, Philippines: Ping on P25 billion for Marcos: It’s absolutely untrue
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Lacson, Gatchalian dispute Zaldy Co’s claim that Marcos ordered P100-B insertion in 2025 budget
WATCH VIDEO: Lacson, Gatchalian dispute Zaldy Co’s claim that Marcos ordered P100-B insertion in 2025 budget
Lacson, Gatchalian dispute Zaldy Co’s claim that Marcos ordered P100-B insertion in 2025 budget
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Bernardo: Kickbacks went to Bersamin, ex-DepEd usec
MANILA, Philippines — Although the P100 billion in alleged bicameral insertions detailed by resigned congressman Zaldy Co is true, the claim that President Marcos ordered the additions in return for kickbacks was “absolutely untrue,” according to Senate President Pro Tempore Panfilo Lacson.
Speaking during the plenary debates on the 2026 budget yesterday, Lacson said he made the conclusion after he spoke with former public works undersecretary Roberto Bernardo, who allegedly handled the distribution of kickbacks for politicians and public works officials.
Lacson said he and finance committee chairman Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian had independently reviewed the list Co published on social media.
“Your honor and I both know the P100 B – and both of us went through the list independently – and you and I agree that the list of the P100 B is true. It was really inserted in the bicam,” Lacson said.
However, Lacson rejected Co’s accompanying allegation that P25 billion or 25 percent of the amount was delivered as “commission” for Marcos.
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“That I will attest as false. That is absolutely untrue or completely false,” Lacson said.
He explained that the clarification came from Bernardo, who contacted him after
seeing Co’s accusation on social media.
According to Lacson, Bernardo told him that Marcos was name-dropped by two undersecretaries – Trygve Olaivar of the Department of Education (DepEd) and Adrian Bersamin of the Presidential Legislative Liaison Office (PLLO) – in order to allegedly make Co believe that it was the President who ordered insertions in the bicam.
Lacson said Bernardo reviewed his notes and provided a detailed breakdown.
The latter reportedly told Lacson that about P81 billion of the P100 billion went to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), with P52 billion personally handled by Bernardo.
Lacson said Bernardo claimed he delivered P8 billion in kickbacks out of the P52 billion “not to the President but to Usec Olaivar,” and that Olaivar was supposedly working with Bersamin.
Bernardo also allegedly recounted a series of cash deliveries using armored vans, including one amounting to roughly P2 billion.
Bernardo also allegedly delivered P1 billion to former DPWH secretary Manuel Bonoan.
Lacson said Bernardo’s written account had been sent to President Marcos, believed to be the reason that executive secretary Lucas Bersamin resigned.
The senator stressed that the President’s own actions contradicted Co’s claim, noting that several items in the P100-billion list were placed under “FLR” (for later release) and later vetoed.
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“If the President knew and he was the one who ordered the P100B insertions in the GAA (General Appropriations Act) in the bicam, why would he veto that?” he said, citing the same observation raised by Gatchalian.
Gatchalian affirmed Lacson’s findings during the session.
“While you were examining 2025 GAA, we were also busy inspecting… our findings were the same,” he said.
Lacson’s office released a portion of the list under the P82-billion insertions for public works projects, wherein listed were several projects worth a total of P1.15 billion vetoed by Marcos.
He again called the 2025 GAA as the “most corrupt budget” ever, attributed to a syndicate led by Bonoan, Olaivar, Bersamin and resigned DPWH undersecretary Maria Catalina Cabral.
‘New’ pork barrel
Lacson also exposed the new pork barrel system in the 2025 GAA, termed “allocable” by Bernardo in blowing the lid off the flood control corruption.
Under this scheme, lawmakers are given funding for their pet projects for inclusion in the National Expenditure Program (NEP).
“Why does the funding come first before the projects are identified? Shouldn’t the projects be identified first before funding is allocated for them?” Lacson asked during his plenary interpellation of the budget.
“Shouldn’t there be items from the regional development council before the funding? In this case, the funding came first before the identification of projects in the NEP,” he added.
“It’s just now that I heard of allocables. An allocable is equivalent to pork barrel because it allows items to be funded before they are identified,” Lacson said in a separate radio interview.
In the P6.326-trillion national budget in 2025, Lacson said the House leadership has P143.5 billion in so-called “allocables” and that “non-legislators” even had a share of this allocable – pertaining to Bonoan, Bernardo and Bersamin.
‘Kept in the dark’
Meanwhile, the House minority bloc yesterday revealed that they were kept in the dark during deliberations on the 2025 national budget, which was signed into law in December 2024.
“We don’t know that, even if the minority leader is a member of all committees. But if we look at what usually happens, that’s what happened,” House Minority Leader Marcelino Libanan said, noting that budget details in the bicam were limited to Zaldy Co and his Senate counterpart, former senator Grace Poe.
For her part, Deputy Minority Leader and ML party-list Rep. Leila de Lima called for clarity and sobriety “amid all the smoke, mirrors and spectacle.”
“Investigate all. Leave no stone unturned,” she said.
The Makabayan bloc, on the other hand, said Lacson’s exoneration of Marcos is premature and unsupported by evidence at this point.
“We demand that Undersecretary Bernardo be immediately summoned by the appropriate congressional committees and required to make statements under oath regarding the involvement of Malacañang personalities in this SOP (standard operating procedure) scheme,” it said.
DPWH cleanup
At the same time, Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon has named Assistant Secretary for Regional Operations in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao Nerie Bueno as vice-chair of the DPWH Central Office Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) for Goods and Services, replacing former assistant secretary Loreta Malaluan who retired last August.
Currently serving as chair of the procurement body is DPWH Assistant Secretary for Technical Services Medmier Malig, appointed just last October.
Malig and Bueno are both career executives at the DPWH, already serving as assistant secretaries during the time of Bonoan.
Malaluan, before her retirement on Aug. 29, had rapidly risen through the ranks during the time of Bonoan, having been a regional director of DPWH Region 2 when Bonoan was named agency chief in July 2022. — Marc Jayson Cayabyab, Delon Porcalla, Rainier Allan Ronda, Jose Rodel Clapano
