Sen. Panfilo Lacson. (File photo by JAM STA. ROSA / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
MANILA, Philippines — Anti-“pork” advocate Senator Panfilo Lacson heaved a sigh of relief on Tuesday when he found an “unlikely ally” in House Majority Leader Rolando Andaya Jr.
The senator’s reaction came following Andaya’s revelation that one contractor had won 30 government projects worth billions of pesos even before Congress could pass the 2019 budget.
READ: Andaya bares favored Palace contractor
The expose, Lacson said, warrants an investigation either by Congress or the Office of the Ombudsman.
“Expose pa more!” the senator said in a Twitter post. “A single contractor bagging 30 flood control projects worth billions of pesos calls for a congressional inquiry/Ombudsman investigation.”
“Thank God, I found an unlikely ‘ally’ in Cong. Andaya,” Lacson said.
When Lacson earlier alleged that members of the House of Representatives would get P60 million worth of projects each in the 2019 budget, Andaya retorted that senators would get bigger budget as they were allegedly allotted P200 million each.
But Andaya repeatedly denied that the allocations for the pet projects of legislators were “pork.”’
Even Senator Sherwin Gatchalian wondered how the contractor managed to bag the contracts with the government.
“The question is: who is the strong backer of this contractor that enabled him to corner 30 projects wort of billions even though pang ari-sari store lang SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) papers nya?” Gatchalian said, reacting to Lacson’s tweet.
In a speech Monday, Andaya identified the contractor as Bulacan-based construction firm, CT Leoncio Construction and Trading, which he said was not even a registered corporation but a single proprietorship owned by a certain Consolacion Tubuhan Leoncio.
The firm, Andaya said, Andaya had won government contracts in several provinces, including Catanduanes and Sorsogon. /jpv