The hen that clucks

Those who have tuned out of the impeachment trial to preserve their mental health may be drawn back to the proceedings this Week 3.

Apart from the expected Senate voting today over the opening of bank records and financial transactions of Vice President Sara Duterte and her husband Manases Carpio, fireworks are expected tomorrow between the Cayetano siblings and National Bureau of Investigation Director Melvin Matibag.

The NBI chief, who has decided to forgo his fanboy moment in Bangkok with the chief of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation so he can face the Senate, says he is puzzled by the passionate reaction of siblings Alan Peter and Pia Cayetano to his disclosure that he would take a second look at the alleged anomalies during the 2019 Southeast Asian Games.

Never mind if Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon, who started out as President Marcos’ fair-haired boy in the anti-corruption crackdown, may become among the top casualties in this probe.

Matibag doesn’t seem worried about such a fallout, or intimidated by the reactions of the Cayetanos to his announcement.

Last Friday, Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla waded in, saying his office had started reviewing the dismissal of the graft and malversation complaint filed against Dizon.

Remulla’s predecessor Samuel Martires had dismissed the case in December 2021, at the height of the lockdowns for COVID, when Dizon was named “testing czar” by then president Rodrigo Duterte. Dizon was also the deputy chief implementer of the National Action Plan Against COVID-19 (peace adviser Carlito Galvez Jr. was the chief implementer).

Dizon, as chairman of the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA), had signed the contract with Malaysian firm MTD Capital Berhad for the construction of the New Clark City sports complex, including the giant cauldron landmark.

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Duterte had cleared his 2016 running mate Cayetano, who chaired the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee (PHISGOC), of any wrongdoing related to the project.

Matibag told “Storycon” on One News last Friday that a complaint was in fact filed against the PHISGOC board members.

PHISGOC was registered as a private non-stock, non-profit corporation in June 2018, when Cayetano was the secretary of foreign affairs. He was the House speaker when the SEA Games were held.

Matibag found it curious that while Cayetano was presented in public as the PHISGOC chair, he is not listed in the official registration as a member of the corporate board, perhaps because of possible conflict of interest. This alone warrants a deeper probe, Matibag said.

The complaint covers questionable fund transfers to PHISGOC and unliquidated expenditures amounting to billions incurred in the course of the SEA Games. These are apart from the alleged anomalies in the construction of the facilities involving the BCDA, Matibag told us.

He pointed out that he did not name anyone when he announced the SEA Games probe. So Matibag wondered, tongue-in-cheek, why the Cayetanos felt alluded to and had a strong reaction when he announced the probe.

Kung sino ang pumutak o tumilaok, siya ang nangitlog, Matibag said. Literally, the chicken that clucks is the one that laid the egg.

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There are ties that bind Dizon and Cayetano. Dizon served as consultant to Cayetano when the latter was a senator, from 2013 until the end of his term in 2016. After Cayetano lost to Leni Robredo, Duterte appointed him as foreign affairs chief and Dizon as BCDA president and CEO.

In October 2020, the Citizens Crime Watch Association filed graft and malversation complaints against Dizon, then government corporate counsel Elpidio Vega and MTD Capital Berhad director Isaac David over the New Clark City sports complex.

Dizon resigned from the BCDA in October 2021. Two months later, as he played a critical role in the COVID response, Martires dismissed the complaint against him.

According to reports, a Senate probe in 2019 showed that an initial P7.5 billion for the SEA Games was lodged in the budget of the Department of Foreign Affairs, when Cayetano was the DFA chief. The amount was later pruned to P5 billion and transferred to the Philippine Sports Commission, although P1.5 billion in “financial assistance” from the Duterte government reportedly went to PHISGOC.

Matibag said they also unearthed documents showing that PHISGOC failed to liquidate P2.2 billion in government funds meant for the SEA Games.

He did not identify the source of the documents given to him. But these are stuff that don’t simply fall into the lap of the NBI chief overnight, after a senator questions his skipping the impeachment trial to attend a symposium in Thailand.

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Most of us have forgotten the scandal over the SEA Games and its P50-million cauldron. (Cayetano at the time said the money for the kaldero came from the private sector.) Pinoys have a short memory, so it’s easy to sweep anomalies under the rug.

Just look at those two former Monetary Board members who were forced to resign over ghost employees in their offices, V. Bruce Tolentino and Anita Linda Aquino. Ombudsman Remulla may also want to look into this case, where no criminal indictments were ever filed. Did a patron who was powerful in the Duterte administration get the two off the hook?

In the case of Cayetano, it does look like there has been an effort to prick the image he has tried to cultivate as an “ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Cayetano says the government should also pursue the flood control scandal. It’s a common public sentiment, but coming from him, it sounds self-serving. Maybe the NBI, or Sen. Panfilo Lacson, can look into the continuing massive reclamation projects in Laguna de Bay along C-6 from Taguig to Taytay, in the guise of flood control.

Vince Dizon, not too long ago even touted as 2028 presidential material, is the collateral damage. Incidentally, there are reports that Dizon has been on leave for about two weeks now from the DPWH.

Regardless of what’s driving the probes by the ombudsman and NBI, public interest in the unresolved scandal has been revived. The Marcos administration must see it through. Let the chips fall where they may.