Chain of custody : Lacson secures ‘Floodgate’ evidence

Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson on Sunday assured the public that all documents retrieved from former Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) Bulacan Assistant Engineer Brice Hernandez will undergo proper procedure to preserve the chain of custody.

Lacson disclosed that Hernandez returned items, including documents and a computer, after he was allowed to leave the Senate premises on Saturday to gather evidence on alleged payoffs and kickbacks.

“These items are sealed for now. We will follow a procedure to preserve a chain of custody,” he said in Filipino. “We need to preserve the chain of custody so that if the evidence is vital to a case, it will not be compromised.”

Lacson, the chair of the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee investigating the so-called “Floodgate” scandal, said that if the evidence includes proof of kickbacks or commissions, he will immediately send them to the Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI) for investigation and prosecution.

The scandal has centered on dubious flood control projects, with funding traced to the National Expenditure Program (NEP) submitted by the Department of Budget and Management and padded further through congressional insertions.

While lawmakers and DPWH officials have been implicated, along with contractors who enriched themselves, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is ultimately being held accountable by many for signing and approving the national budget.

On Saturday, former Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonio Carpio said Marcos did not veto P421 billion of congressional insertions in the 2025 budget, thus he is responsible for corruption that is “worse” than during martial law under his late father.

Marcos’ DBM chief, Secretary Amenah Pangandaman, admitted her agency failed to catch the same DPWH projects being funded for consecutive years, eliciting a comment from Rep. Ronaldo Puno that the DBM may well be useless, a department populated by mere “stenographers.”

The controversy has already triggered leadership shakeups in both chambers of Congress, with Senate President Francis Escudero and House Speaker Martin Romualdez being forced to step down amid pressure from the public.

The issue has also fueled calls during the 21 September protest rallies at Luneta and the People Power Monument in EDSA for Marcos to resign, with activists claiming at least P1 trillion was lost to corruption in 2025 alone.

The date coincides with the 53rd anniversary of the declaration of martial law by the president’s father and namesake on 21 September 1972.

Estrada, Villanueva tagged

Hernandez, during a House tri-committee hearing, tagged Senators Jinggoy Estrada and Joel Villanueva as among those who allegedly benefited from anomalous flood control projects across the country.

The next Blue Ribbon Committee hearing is set on Tuesday, 22 September, with new witnesses expected. Lacson said resigned DPWH Secretary Manuel Bonoan and retired Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo may be among those invited, “as they have much to explain.”

He pointed to a photo showing Bernardo with DPWH’s so-called “BGC Boys” — engineers linked to corruption behind ghost and substandard projects in Bulacan’s first engineering district.

The group, including Hernandez, reportedly gambled away hundreds of millions of pesos in taxpayers’ money in casinos.

“What was Bernardo doing in that gathering with the BGC Boys? He has some explaining to do,” Lacson asked, noting that Bernardo had been involved in the appointments of Hernandez and district engineer Henry Alcantara.

As for Bonoan, Lacson said the former secretary must shed light on how more than P600 million in cash deliveries were allegedly made by Syms Construction owner Sally Santos to the First District Engineering Office this year.

At the same time, Lacson renewed his call to ban lawmakers from making insertions for infrastructure projects in the national budget, saying the corruption that has triggered public outrage “all stem from the insertions made by greedy lawmakers.”

“Both houses of Congress must agree not to make insertions for infrastructure projects. Institutional amendments are allowed, but other insertions must be removed,” he said.

Lacson argued that lawmakers’ meddling in projects has been “the root of massive corruption.” Without insertions, he said, there would be no funds for corrupt DPWH officials “to play with or gamble away in casinos.”

Unprogrammed funds misuse

The senator urged that instead of pork-like insertions, lawmakers should focus on institutional amendments such as restoring funds to agencies like the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), whose proposed P333.1 million 2026 budget was slashed to P170.161 million under the National Expenditure Program.

He also cautioned against the misuse of unprogrammed funds. Lacson cited documents from Senator Sherwin Gatchalian showing that P600 million supposedly for flood control projects in Bulacan was lodged in the Unprogrammed Fund under the 2023 General Appropriations Act — one of the allocations Hernandez linked Villanueva to.

“Congress starts the corruption because of numerous insertions involving hundreds of billions of pesos,” Lacson said.

As this developed, Senator Erwin Tulfo called on couple-contractors Pacifico “Curle” Discaya and Sarah Discaya, as well as dismissed Bulacan First District Engineer Henry Alcantara, to name the high-ranking government officials involved in flood control anomalies.

This was after Hernandez, former Assistant District Engineer, revealed sensitive information to the ICI, according to Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong.

“If they’re afraid to tell everything to the Blue Ribbon, then they can do it at the ICI instead, because their statements there will be strictly confidential, but still under oath, of course,” Tulfo said.