(UPDATE) SEN. Panfilo Lacson on Wednesday said he believed there is “no overall mastermind” in the flood control fund mess, which he earlier described as the largest corruption scandal in Philippine history.
Lacson’s remarks ran counter to critics of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and former House speaker Martin Romualdez, who tagged them as the masterminds of the bribery scandal.
“There’s no overall mastermind. I don’t think there is an overall mastermind because as I said, this was driven by greed,” Lacson said in a media forum.
“I think that there is a mastermind in every region, in every [Department of Public Works and Highways] district engineering office (DEO),” the Senate president pro tempore said in Filipino.
“There is an organized group within a certain agency, within a certain DEO. That qualifies as a syndicate,” added Lacson, chairman of the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, which investigated ghost flood control projects.
In a privilege speech on Tuesday, Lacson raised the need to finally curb the “systemic and parasitic” greed behind anomalous flood control projects.
The senator also debunked repeated accusations that he does not want to invite Romualdez to the panel’s hearings, noting this was already done, but Romualdez did not attend.
He said the invitations to incumbent lawmakers were extended through the Office of the Speaker, in accordance with the established inter-chamber courtesy, to maintain the balance and mutual respect that define bicameral relations.
In his privilege speech where he detailed the progress of the panel’s investigation, Lacson also turned the tables on those who insisted on disregarding inter-parliamentary or inter-chamber courtesy in summoning lawmakers to the hearings.
“Whoever has information, or if they can name these ‘cong-tractors’ like Ombudsman Remulla is doing, name them. If you have the evidence, present it. If you know the perpetrators, expose them,” Lacson said.
“The committee will provide the platform for you,” he said.
Lacson set the record straight anew, saying he never claimed to have the list of such cong-tractors (congressmen-contractors), saying a then lawmaker merely mentioned the matter to him, without details.
If inter-parliamentary courtesy is disregarded, he said the Senate may need to be prepared to allow its members to face investigations by the House of Representatives.
“For example, if Sen. Rodante Marcoleta were hypothetically invited or subpoenaed by the House Committee on Justice over alleged anomalies in his statement of contributions and expenditures, will the Senate leadership or Sen[ator] Marcoleta be prepared to disregard inter-parliamentary courtesy?” Lacson asked.
He noted that in June 2024, the House invited Sen. Ronald Dela Rosa to its hearing on the Duterte administration’s “war on drugs,” but he did not attend on the advice of then-Senate president Francis Escudero as a matter of inter-chamber courtesy.
“That is why I always emphasize that this is not merely a matter of practice — it is grounded in principle,” Lacson said.