The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) believes it has uncovered several “smoking guns” in its investigation into the hosting of the 2019 Southeast Asian Games, an event that may have cost the government between P10 billion and P15 billion, with the exact amount still being determined through the ongoing probe.

NBI Director Melvin Matibag has expressed confidence that the leads that investigators are pursuing are credible and supported by documentary evidence.

The remaining challenge is to piece together how the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee (Phisgoc) was created and operated. Investigators are examining the role of the private organization, which allegedly failed to fully account for billions of pesos in public funds entrusted to it for the staging of the 2019 SEA Games.

The answers, Matibag indicated, lie in reconstructing the paper trail, identifying those who exercised authority and determining where accountability ultimately rests.

Among the trails being pursued is Senator Alan Peter Cayetano’s talent beyond organizing sporting events — and his remarkable instinct for making himself part of the story. His real talent may be volunteering answers before anyone has finished asking the questions.

Matibag said he did not name Cayetano. He said the senator’s name was nowhere in the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee papers from 2019 through 2026.

Cayetano, however, heard “Phisgoc,” put on the senator-judge’s robe and expressed indignation toward Matibag, who appeared surprised because nobody had publicly linked the senator to Phisgoc in that exchange until Cayetano inserted himself into it.

Matibag laid out two doors, and both led to uncomfortable questions. If Phisgoc’s General Information Sheet is accurate, meaning Cayetano genuinely held no board seat, then his previous public claims of chairing the organization would naturally invite questions about the accuracy of those statements.

If, instead, evidence ultimately shows that he exercised authority beyond what the corporate records reflect, that too would raise questions investigators may have to examine under applicable laws. Either way, the golden kaldero isn’t the embarrassment anymore. The senator’s own reflex is.

Not content with the self-inflicted controversy, Cayetano’s allies then tried to relitigate the timing of Matibag’s impeachment-trial testimony as some institutional affront. They called the NBI chief’s act done in bad taste, presuming to dictate terms to the Senate.

Matibag replied that he never dictated anything. He said he wrote the prosecution to ask whether he could testify earlier because of a scheduling conflict, while making it clear that appearing before the impeachment court remained the higher priority. His simple request — ”May I go early?” — was portrayed as something far more sinister.

Matibag, to his credit, is not playing the martyr or demanding sympathy or immunity from scrutiny. He is simply pointing out that an NBI director does not stop doing his job simply because he is sitting in a witness chair.

None of this establishes that Cayetano committed any wrongdoing. That remains for investigators, prosecutors and, if warranted, the courts to determine. But politically, the senator accomplished something remarkable. He shifted attention from what Matibag actually said to why he reacted so quickly.

He supplied the political optics himself, plank by unnecessary plank, in real time, on camera.

The NBI may ultimately determine where the evidence leads. In the meantime, Cayetano’s strongest critic has not been Matibag but his own political instincts. Sometimes the loudest defense is the one that invites the next question.