Senate President Pro Tempore Panfilo "Ping" Lacson said on Wednesday, Dec. 3, that more than P180 billion has likely been lost to ghost flood control projects dating back to 2016, not counting substandard ones.

Lacson said he and Senate finance committee chairman Sherwin Gatchalian arrived at this estimate based on some 10,000 projects inspected so far, where more than 600 were found to be ghost or nonexistent.

"We are looking at 30,000 flood control projects since 2016. If we extrapolate based on earlier findings that more than 600 out of 10,000 projects were ghost, Sen. Gatchalian and I estimated that 6% or higher of 30,000 projects could mean P180 billion or higher went to ghost projects," he said in a mix of English and Filipino in an interview on DZBB radio.

"Imagine, we likely lost P180 billion to ghost projects, and we have not yet started counting our losses to substandard projects," he added.

He noted this renders minuscule the number of projects uncovered and tackled so far by the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, which he chairs. Lacson had also detailed the corruption behind substandard and ghost flood control projects in privilege speeches last August and September.

Also, Lacson shared observations that the P110 million "returned" by former Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) district engineer Henry Alcantara last week was a "pittance," even if he is expected to return an additional P200 million in the coming weeks.

Lacson said the Blue Ribbon Committee remains ready to help relevant agencies like the Independent Commission for Infrastructure, the Department of Justice, and the Office of the Ombudsman in pursuing charges against those involved, if it gets new information.

"If new information is brought before the Committee, hopefully we can help the ICI, Ombudsman and DOJ," he said.

Meanwhile, Lacson said the Senate has started undoing some of the practices related to the anomalous flood control projects with its efforts to ensure transparency in crafting the budget.

He said the measures, including livestreaming the period of amendments and making public all senators' individual amendments, should block allocables, leadership funds, and other forms of pork barrel in the 2026 budget.

"There will be no room for allocables because we made the process transparent. If you watched our livestream Tuesday, we introduced individual amendments on the floor, unlike in the past when lawmakers just wrote their amendments on paper and passed it to the finance committee chairman," he said.

"We started this in the Senate yesterday. All individual amendments were introduced personally or read by Senate Finance Committee chairman Sherwin Gatchalian. Sen. Gatchalian read the individual amendments of 11 senators. He will now study which amendments to accept and which to reject," he added.

Earlier, Lacson scored allocables as the new pork barrel, after scrutinizing documents related to the 2025 budget, which he described as "corrupt to the core."

He said allocables, which allow items to be funded before they are identified by lawmakers, are in the National Expenditure Program - the proposed budget prepared by the Executive Department before it is submitted to Congress.

Lacson said the majority bloc has decided to entrust and fully support Gatchalian on which amendments to accept and reject. He noted Gatchalian is in coordination with the Senate Legislative Budget Research and Monitoring Office (LBRMO), which will analyze the amendments every step of the way.

"We entrust Gatchalian to decide which amendments to accept or reject. We will support him should the matter come to a vote on the floor," he said.

Also, Lacson said the Senate and House of Representatives have agreed to simplify the bicameral conference committee proceedings, to tackle only the disagreeing provisions of the Senate and House versions of the budget bill - and not any "alien" provision inserted into either version.

On the other hand, he said Gatchalian will have the amendments and related details posted on the Senate website's transparency portal.

"This will be simpler and more transparent, and that is our intention. In the bicam, we will ensure transparency, all the way to the bill being enrolled," he said.