Senator Lacson flags alleged Taguig project anomalies totaling P2.385B

Senator Panfilo "Ping" Lacson on Wednesday disclosed findings from his review of infrastructure allocations in Taguig City, saying the amount of alleged insertions in the 2025 national budget has grown to P2.385 billion.

According to Lacson, his team identified three more slope protection projects worth P100 million each under the 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA), adding P300 million to the previously reported P2.085 billion in questioned allocations.

He also said the latest review uncovered what appear to be duplicate appropriations for the same slope protection project, suggesting that one of the two P100-million allocations could be a ghost project.

"From P2.085B as earlier reported we found three-P100M additional slope protection projects for a new total of P2.385B insertions under the 2025 GAA. Two items appear to be double appropriations, involving two (2)-P100M for the same slope protection project. One of the two must be ghost," he said in a post on X Wednesday afternoon.

The senator had earlier reported at least two suspected ghost infrastructure projects in Taguig, along with numerous slope protection and drainage projects—many of them carrying P100-million price tags—that initially totaled P2.085 billion.

Over the weekend, Lacson also revealed that his investigation had uncovered projects involving companies owned by the Discaya family that were allegedly carried out by another contractor under a 5-percent royalty arrangement.

He likewise identified projects awarded to Topnotch Catalyst Builders, one of the contractors included in President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s list last year of the country's top 15 flood control project builders.

Lacson noted that some of the questioned projects, including those linked to Discaya-owned firms, date back to 2019 and 2020 when former Senate President Alan Peter Cayetano was serving as House Speaker.

The senator has said he intends to press on with the investigation after Cayetano questioned his credibility in a Facebook Live broadcast.