Hello and welcome to the details of Philippine prosecutors charge Marcos’ lawmaker cousin with plunder over ‘ghost’ flood projects and now with the details
Nevin Al Sukari - Sana'a - Philippines’ President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. addresses the House of Representatives at the Parliament House in Canberra on February 29, 2024. Philippine prosecutors filed a criminal charge today against a lawmaker and cousin of President Ferdinand Marcos over his alleged involvement in a massive corruption scandal involving bogus flood control projects. — AFP pic
First Published: Monday, 07 Sep 2026 5:28 PM MYT
Last Modified: Monday, 07 Sep 2026 5:32 PM MYT
MANILA, Sept 7 — Philippine prosecutors filed a criminal charge today against a lawmaker and cousin of President Ferdinand Marcos over his alleged involvement in a massive corruption scandal involving bogus flood control projects.
The case came more than a year after Marcos put the so-called “ghost” infrastructure projects, believed to have cost Filipino taxpayers billions of dollars, centre stage in a public address.
Several construction firm owners, government officials and politicians have been accused of pocketing funds from the projects.
Today, Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla said the “plunder” case against Martin Romualdez, the Philippine president’s congressman cousin, involved a total of 7.4 billion pesos (RM476 million) in alleged bribes, anomalous budget insertions and project allocations.
Romualdez has repeatedly denied wrongdoing.
Plunder is a non-bailable offence referring to large-scale corruption punishable by life imprisonment.
“We don’t pick and choose, there is no name here that we’re trying to avoid. Everything here is based on evidence,” Remulla told reporters.
“This case proves that there are no sacred cows.”
Remulla said prosecutors intended to file additional cases against Romualdez and others implicated in the flood control scandal.
Romualdez’s co-respondents include former lawmaker Elizaldy Co and several others accused of conspiring to unlawfully accumulate wealth through government funds.
He did not immediately respond to AFP’s requests for comment.
In September last year, Romualdez resigned as speaker of the House of Representatives after his name surfaced in the widening investigation.
At the time, he said stepping down would allow investigators to perform their work without “undue influence”. He remains a member of congress.
Over the past year, prosecutors have filed cases against a number of sitting and former lawmakers, public works officials and construction company representatives allegedly linked to the scheme.
Corruption has long been a problem in the Philippines’ brand of free-wheeling democracy, and accounts for much of the massive poverty in the South-east Asian nation of 112 million people. — AFP
These were the details of the news Philippine prosecutors charge Marcos’ lawmaker cousin with plunder over ‘ghost’ flood projects for this day. We hope that we have succeeded by giving you the full details and information. To follow all our news, you can subscribe to the alerts system or to one of our different systems to provide you with all that is new.
It is also worth noting that the original news has been published and is available at Malay Mail and the editorial team at AlKhaleej Today has confirmed it and it has been modified, and it may have been completely transferred or quoted from it and you can read and follow this news from its main source.
