Marcos ally exposes Romualdez’s hijacking of budget

NAVOTAS Rep. Tobias “Toby” Tiangco, in the past three years President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s trusted ally that he was made the administration’s campaign manager in the last elections, has accused Speaker Martin Romualdez of hijacking the budget so that dole out funds for the masses are given only to districts whose representatives follow his orders.

Mystery solved: It is through this mechanism that Romualdez in two days’ time got 215 congressmen/women to sign the impeachment complaint against Vice President Sara Duterte, intended not for her “accountability” but in order to prevent her from becoming president in 2028.

It certainly isn’t every day that a sitting congressman — especially one whose wife Michelle is Martin and Marcos’ cousin — unleashes a firestorm in the hallowed halls of the House of Representatives. But when Tiangco took to the plenary earlier this week, leveling explosive allegations against Speaker Romualdez, he did just that. The scandal, dubbed by some as the “Budget Hijack,” threatens to upend both the legislative and political status quo and foreshadow a deeper crisis of trust in the government.

Tiangco, long regarded as a straight-shooter and even an ally of Romualdez himself, minced no words: “We have reached a point where the power to release and realign government spending is concentrated in a single office — the Office of the Speaker. This is not what our Constitution intended. This is not democracy.”

At the core of Tiangco’s allegations is the claim that Romualdez has politicized and centralized the budget process, particularly through the so-called small committee convened after the approval of the national budget on second reading. Instead of open floor debates and amendments — hallmarks of congressional transparency — changes to budget allocations are now allegedly brokered privately, with the speaker’s office as the ultimate gatekeeper.

AKAP

What does this mean in real terms? According to Tiangco, representatives seeking funding for their districts’ social welfare priorities — programs like AKAP for indigents, AICS for distressed families and Tupad for emergency employment — are compelled to submit their requests not to the government agencies tasked to implement them, but directly to the speaker’s inner circle. This, Tiangco argues, both politicizes aid and erodes the principle of agency independence. “Who gets what is determined not by need, but by political loyalty,” he warned.

Looming large in Tiangco’s speech was the ghost of the Priority Development Assistance Fund, or pork barrel, which the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a decade ago. Yet Tiangco maintains that the “hijack” has merely taken a new form.

“Instead of congressional realignments and agency priorities, the power now rests with the budget committee and, ultimately, the speaker. The law says ‘no post-enactment intervention’ — yet here we are, still negotiating allocations after the budget is supposedly final. Only the names have changed,” Tiangco declared.

When asked for proof, Tiangco challenged his colleagues: “Show your phones. Everyone in this chamber has received texts, messages and guidance from the speaker’s office telling us where and how to file our requests. These are not rumors; they are daily practice.” Anecdotally, several lawmakers — speaking off the record — admitted that the process for accessing social assistance funds had become more opaque, with priority seemingly going not just to urgent needs, but also to political allies.

Confirming

The House leadership, as expected, dismissed Tiangco’s statements as “unfounded and unfair.” Spokesman Princess Abante emphasized that government departments, not Speaker Romualdez, retain final say over funding and implementation. “The speaker is not the gatekeeper of public funds. The small committee is a tool for efficiency, not shadow governance,” she said, inadvertently — or stupidly — confirming Tiangco’s claim that such a “small committee” exists.

In the past 19th Congress, when congressmen were bribed to file the impeachment complaint, this committee consisted of Rep. Elizaldy Co., Committee on Appropriations chairman, his vice chairman Stella Quimbo, Majority Leader Mannix Dalipe and Minority Leader Nonoy Libanan — all known to be Romualdez lieutenants.

In the current 20th congress, this secretive cabal consists of Mikaela Angela Suansing as chairman, Albert Garcia as vice chairman, presidential son Ferdinand “Sandro” Marcos as majority leader and Marcelino Libanan as minority leader.

Tiangco has demanded an audit by the Commission on Audit and called for congressional hearings to lay bare the procedural changes brought about by this new regime.

For critics, Tiangco’s revelations confirm long-whispered suspicions: that the mechanisms of government assistance, intended as a lifeline for the country’s most vulnerable citizens, have been bent into tools for perpetuating the rule of the Marcos-Romualdez gang. This centralization, coupled with vague criteria for the release or withholding of funds, makes this tool an easy one to use, and hide.

Graces

“We cannot have a situation where a congressman’s request for Tupad for jobless citizens, or AICS for sick children, is delayed or denied simply because he is not in the good graces of the speaker,” Tiangco stressed. He cited instances where lawmakers abstained or dissented on key votes — only to face unexplained delays in the release of their constituents’ assistance.

“Filipinos don’t care about our politics. They care about hospitals, jobs, food. When these become bargaining chips in our power struggles, democracy loses its soul.”

For years, critics of the post-EDSA political order have bemoaned the “patronage trap” that defines so much of Filipino public life. The fate of vital public services, from health care and road-building to scholarships and relief for calamity victims, too often depends not on merit or need, but on fealty and favor.

Tiangco’s proposed solutions are stark and simple. He wants all budget amendments, including those from the so-called small committee, to be publicly debated and subject to plenary vote — returning the process to transparency. More critically, he insists that all requests for assistance should be routed directly to the agencies responsible, not through a political bottleneck.

“This is not just about one speaker, or even one chamber,” Tiangco insisted. “It’s about preserving the people’s faith that their taxes — and the services they fund — are not tools for political patronage, but instruments of national progress.”

Chapter

It is tempting to view this as another chapter in the never-ending saga of Philippine political drama — one more skirmish, destined for the headlines and then the dustbin of public memory. Yet Tiangco’s battle may prove more consequential.

First, the stakes are immense. The 2025 and the coming 2026 national budgets are one of the largest in Philippine history, with trillions of pesos on the line. The integrity of the process through which these funds are allocated can mean the difference between social uplift and continued stagnation, between trust and cynicism.

Second, the timing is key. The House is already riven by divisions, most dramatically by the failed attempt to impeach Vice President Sara Duterte and the growing rumble of an “independent minority bloc.” In this atmosphere, Tiangco’s willingness to speak out — even at the risk of alienating powerful colleagues — signals both a political crisis and an opportunity for renewal.

Tiangco’s revelations remind of then-Ilocos Sur governor Chavit Singson’s revelations in 2000 that he himself delivered P10 million monthly in payoffs from jueteng to President Joseph Estrada and another P130 million yearly, skimmed from the tobacco excise tax funds allocated to Ilocos Sur. Those revelations ultimately led to President Estrada’s ouster in 2001 through a “people power” type of insurrection.

Finally, the public appears ready for change. Surveys consistently show trust in government at a low ebb, battered by rising prices, horrific floodings and perceptions of massive corruption even at the very center of power.

Tiangco is no naïve idealist; he is a veteran of many battles in and out of the House, and he won’t back down, no matter how much he is offered a bribe. Yet as he closed his speech, his challenge was clear: “Let us not be remembered as the Congress that let democracy die a slow death, strangled by secrecy and self-interest. Let us instead be the House that restored transparency and safeguarded the people’s trust.”

For now, Romualdez remains entrenched, his spokesman dismissing detractors as being motivated by “political ambition and sour grapes.” Yet the speaker’s ability to brush off scandal may not last. If public outrage crystallizes, and if more lawmakers find the courage to speak out, the era of the budget as the House Speaker’s tool may finally be nearing its end.

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Marcos ally exposes Romualdez’s hijacking of budget
Source: Breaking News PH