Martin Romualdez falls

At 10:46 p.m. Tuesday (Sept. 16), Speaker Ferdinand Martin (FM) Gomez Romualdez texted me, “Tomorrow I step down.”

Yesterday, Wednesday, Sept. 17, at 3:24 p.m., Speaker Martin resigned “with a full heart and a clear conscience,” “after deep reflection and prayer.” He was replaced by Congressman Faustino “Bojie” de Guzman Dy III, 62, scion of an entrenched political dynasty in Isabela and an ally of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. (PBBM). Bojie’s only rival was “abstention.”

In his brief 290-word valedictory, Martin recalled that: “In his recent State of the Nation address, our President reminded us that accountability must prevail. And that no one is above scrutiny. I unequivocally embrace that call.” 

Issues surrounding certain infrastructure projects have raised questions on the integrity of the speaker as well as that of the House. “The longer I stay, the heavier that burden grows on me, on this house and on the President. I’ve always sought to support,” Martin said.

His resignation should also enable the Independent Commission on Infrastructure to carry out its investigation, to use Martin’s words, “freely and fully, without doubt, without interference, without undue influence,” to let the truth emerge and that justice is done. “Sometimes the greatest act of leadership is the grace to let it go,” Martin bade goodbye.

The speakership is the fourth highest position in the land, after the president, vice president and Senate president. 

Martin is the latest and among the highest of public officials ensnared by the ongoing “flood-gate” or flood control scandal – the biggest act of corruption ever, the plunder of over P1 trillion of taxpayers’ money over the last 10 years, from flood control.

 FM Romualdez, 62, was the most powerful speaker of the House of Representatives ever. He was also the most controversial. And the most maligned. 

In the first three years of Marcos Jr., Martin produced a debt-ceiling-busting budget of P17.362 trillion – P5.268 trillion in 2023, P5.768 trillion in 2024 and P6.326 trillion in 2025.  

In 1966, his first year as president, Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Sr. spent only P2.5 billion. In 1985, FM’s 20th and last year, he spent only P75 billion, for total expenditures in 20 years of P486 billion. Cory Aquino began with a P114.5-billion budget in 1986 and ended with P286.6 billion in 1992. Today, with engineers from Bulacan, P286.6 billion would just be play money at the casinos.

PBBM’s P6.326-trillion 2025 budget approved by a Romualdez House became the most notorious and corruption-laden. Apparently, up to half of the appropriation would be stolen were it not for an alert and outraged PBBM himself exposing the P1-trillion flood control scandal.

Under engineer Manuel Bonoan, Marcos’s secretary of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), up to P1 trillion was stolen in three years, at the rate of P1 billion a day.

The organized looting was a conspiracy and a syndicated crime.

The unprecedented plunder was committed by corrupt senators (led by the then Senate president Chiz Escudero); corrupt congressmen (led by the just resigned Speaker Romualdez); corrupt DPWH officials (led by the ousted secretary Bonoan) and participated in by up to 100 government engineers (led by the most notorious and most outrageously corrupt of them all, Henry Alcantara and Brice Hernandez, both of Bulacan DPWH first engineering district office), down to the lowest DPWH cashiers; equally corrupt and greedy private contractors (led by the most notorious and most outrageously corrupt of them all – the couple Pacifico and Cezarah Discaya, who bought a Rolls Royce because she liked its freebie umbrella; the two top specialists of ghost projects, Sally Santos of SYMS Construction and Mark Allan Arevalo of Wawao Builders) and cong-contractor congressman on the run Zaldy Co. 

Not to be ignored are officials of the Commission on Audit (who failed in their job) and owners of casinos (who happily helped launder the massive loot) through the years.

The stink from the loot was so oppressive and outrageous it made Bongbong Marcos cry on television. The stink had begun to destabilize his government. The President was forced to clean house, or Malacañang itself would be cleaned out of its occupants. 

On Sept. 8, 2025, Escudero was ousted and replaced by come-backing Senate President Tito Sotto, the most senior of senators. Chiz’s two allies were also ousted, Senate Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada and Majority Leader Joel Villanueva, both of whom were accused by the notorious DPWH assistant engineer Brice Hernandez of having demanded and received 30 percent bribe money, of P355 million and P600 million, respectively. Ousted too was freshman Senator Rodante Marcoleta, as chair of the powerful Senate anti-graft Blue Ribbon committee (are tons of bribe money in boxes tied with blue ribbon?). He was replaced by former national police chief Senator Panfilo Lacson.

Yesterday, Sept. 17, it was time for the House to clean house. This leaves the Executive to do its own housecleaning.

DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon confided to interviewer Karen Davila: “Matagal na ako sa gobyerno. I’ve been in and out of government for more than two decades, 26-27 years. Ngayon lang ako nakakita ng ahensyang ganito kagulo. I thought DOTr was difficult and bad. But DPWH, ibang level ito. I mean, yung gulo sa loob – yung mga nakuwento sa akin na mga ginagawa sa loob, hindi kapani-paniwala!”

“For someone who has been in government for quite some time, I am shocked with what I have seen and find out every day,” Dizon said in Pilipino.

Vince has sued 25 people – 20 from DPWH and five contractors – for anti-graft, malversation of public money for which there is no bail if the amounts involved are P8.8 million or more.

Vince vows to go after the corrupt engineers and contractors and their cohorts. “No one will be spared,” he says. “I will drive you to penury.”

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