Davao del Norte Rep. Pantaleon Alvarez has neither the legal nor moral right to file graft charges against Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez in connection with the 2025 national budget since he never registered his complaint nor his allegations during the approval of the budget measure, House assistant majority leader Pammy Zamora claimed.
As a sitting member of the House, Alvarez had every opportunity to raise these concerns during the budget deliberations and approval process but did not, Zamora, also the Taguig City representative, said.
“It’s very ironic that Mr. Alvarez barely participated in the non-stop budget hearings that we’ve had for the 2025 budget, whether sa committee level or sa plenary. Wala naman siyang ni-raise na concern,” she said in a press release from the office of Romualdez, adding she was consistently present on the session floor and seldom saw Alvarez raise any issue.
1-Rider Party-list Rep. Rodge Gutierrez echoed Zamora’s sentiment, and questioned the timing and venue of Alvarez’s complaint, suggesting that if the issue was genuinely about the law, it should have been raised earlier or filed before the Supreme Court.
He found it curious that the complaint was filed in a criminal venue rather than seeking clarification from the Supreme Court regarding legislative procedures.
The complaints filed by Alvarez and his co-complainants alleged that funds were inserted into the General Appropriations Act without proper inclusion in the bicameral conference committee report.
They claimed that these insertions were not present in the report signed and approved by both House and Senate members. ||
