Follow-Up: Lawmaker Testifies Marcos Confronted Romualdez Over Budget Insertions in 2024, Citing a 20 Percent Kickback Claim
Testifying at the Sandiganbayan Third Division's bail hearing in the plunder case against former House Speaker Martin Romualdez, Navotas Representative Toby Tiangco said President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. had confronted his cousin over budget insertions and kickbacks as early as November 24, 2024. At a Sunday family lunch at the presidential residence Bahay Pangulo, Marcos summoned Romualdez back by phone from Tacloban and berated him for about an hour and a half over project insertions in the 2025 budget, Tiangco testified.
According to Tiangco, Marcos said he knew that Zaldy Co, then chairman of the appropriations committee, was demanding a 20 percent commission from colleagues for each inserted project. Tiangco also described his own experience: in 2023 he tried to bypass Co by asking another lawmaker close to Romualdez to insert a 200-million-peso project for Navotas, but Co was alerted anyway and, because Tiangco is a presidential relative by marriage, offered to cut his commission from 20 percent to 10 percent; Tiangco dropped the project. In the hearing he also discussed the alleged 20 percent rate and roughly 209 billion pesos in projects the House added to the 2025 budget, saying lists came from the late Public Works Undersecretary Catalina Cabral and former Deputy Speaker Jay-Jay Suarez.
At the same hearing, Public Works Programming Division chief Peter Paul Cortez testified that the department's database tagged Romualdez as the proponent of about 27.4 billion pesos in infrastructure projects, entered on Cabral's instructions, while admitting he had never spoken with Romualdez or his staff about them. Romualdez and Co are accused of receiving 7.44 billion pesos in kickbacks from flood-control and infrastructure projects between 2022 and 2025; Romualdez has denied all charges and pleaded not guilty. Co previously claimed in videos that Marcos ordered the insertions, which Malacañang has dismissed as hearsay.
Source: Sandiganbayan
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：菲律宾奎松市的反贪法院 Sandiganbayan 大楼（资料图）。图：Judgefloro，公共领域，经维基共享资源 / the Sandiganbayan building in Quezon City, Philippines (file photo). Photo by Judgefloro, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Russian Diplomat: Moscow Could Sign Non-Aggression Pacts With Individual NATO Members as Part of a New European Security Framework2026-11-11
41-Year-Old US Army Officer Arrested Near Gloucester on November 10: Suspected Offences Under National Security Act Sections 1 and 3, Allegations Relate to Russia2026-11-11