Escudero, Co tagged as ‘culprits’ in 2025 budget insertions

House Deputy Speaker Ronaldo Puno on Wednesday explicitly named then-Senate President Chiz Escudero and Ako Bicol Rep. Elizaldy Co as the culprits behind the alleged anomalous last-minute insertions in the highly criticized 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA).

“It takes a lot of, you know, real painstaking work to do it. But it was the two [who] actually finalized those things. And that is what I’m saying, that did not come to light until just recently,” Puno said in an interview.

Puno disclosed that Escudero and Co made up the so-called small committee, with Speaker Martin Romualdez and former Senator Grace Poe, who chaired the Senate Finance Committee in the 19th Congress.

Co is the former chairperson of the House committee on appropriations and co-headed the bicameral conference committee with Poe.

The bicam is composed of selected members of the House and the Senate, but Puno said, “they decided to make a small committee,” which consolidated the independent amendments to the GAB.

Puno narrated that the four-member small committee held several meetings, in which Romualdez and Poe did not attend, leaving Escudero and Co as the only attendees.

“When the committee went into their meetings, this is where the insertions were put in by the way," he averred.

“It ended up Zaldy Co and Senate President Escudero were the ones [who] actually penciled in whatever needed to be penciled in,” the lawmaker continued.

Under the 2025 GAA, Puno said around 20,000 infrastructure projects received allocation under the Department of Public Works and Highways’ budget.

Puno earlier belied accusations that the House was to blame for the nearly P12-billion budget cut in the Department of Education and the zero subsidies for the state insurer PhilHealth under this year’s budget, asserting that the allocation for them remained intact in the House version of the GAB prior to its transmission to the Senate.

However, when the Senate returned the bill to the House, Puno claimed that they noticed significant changes, including the jacking up of the DPWH’s budget.

“The House version did not have insertions; it went to the Senate,” he contended.

Puno strongly posits that Escudero and Co are solely responsible for the alleged budget manipulation “because the version that they sent back to the House already included all the insertions,” which he claimed was a “bicameral thing.”

“I think that’s what also triggered, I guess, the reorganization in the Senate because they know now,” he added.

Puno mentioned that he convinced Romualdez to counter the allegations of budget manipulation and clear his name, but the latter allegedly refused to avoid an “argument with the Senate President.”

“I’ll just swallow all of these. Anyway, I’m used to this,” Puno said, quoting Romualdez.

“He didn’t want to get into any dispute with the Senate. But I think this is part of the reason why he has become so much a target for everyone,” he added.

Last year, allies of former president Rodrigo Duterte sued several House leaders of the 19th Congress, including Romualdez and Co, in the Ombudsman, accusing them of “illegally” inserting P241 billion in “blank items” in the bicam report of the 2025 budget.

House leaders, however, dismissed the complaint as political retaliation following the impeachment of Vice President Sara Duterte, asserting that the bicam is a collegial body.

Meanwhile, Puno is expecting that the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee’s probe into the flood control scheme would further unearth the anomalies tied to the budget.

Escudero had admitted receiving P30 million in campaign donations from Lawrence Lubiano, president of the Centerways Construction and Development Inc., which was among the 15 construction firms that bagged P100 billion in flood control contracts from the government nationwide.

Meanwhile, Co is being tagged as the proponent of P13.8 billion in insertions in the 2025 budget. He denied the allegations.

Co is currently in the United States for “medical treatment,” but Puno said he “should be brought back forcibly [to the Philippines] if necessary.”