One-time Senate Blue Ribbon Committee witness Orly Guteza's first affidavit on the flood control mess was compromised to begin with.

Former House Speaker, Leyte 1st district Rep. Martin Romualdez--whom Guteza accused of receiving cash luggage (maleta) payoffs from anomalous or "ghost" flood control projects--raised this point as he gave further context to the supposed "star witness'" eventual recantation.

According to Romualdez, Guteza’s intial affidavit was already under a cloud before he took it back: The document’s supposed notary denied signing it, a Manila court treated it as falsified, and the people Guteza named as possible corroborators rejected the alleged cash deliveries.

That's why the Office of the Ombudsman led by Jesus Crispin "Boying" Remulla cannot presume that Guteza’s first version is true, and then claim that his recantation is disputed, Romualdez's camp said.

Romualdez's Supplemental Counter-Affidavit filed on August 20, 2026 said Guteza’s original account was never independently tested before a court. On page 17, he stated: “Even during the proceedings for the issuance of a Precautionary Hold Departure Order before the Sandiganbayan, complainant [Special Panel of Investigators (SPI)] did not present Guteza for personal examination, re-swearing, or independent verification.”

"More fundamentally, the Guteza Recantation Salaysay does not introduce doubt into an otherwise stable and independently corroborated account," he said. In context, the supplemental filing argues that the earlier account was not stable or independently corroborated in the first place.

Romualdez then listed the defects on page 18: “As already exhaustively demonstrated in my Counter-Affidavit, the Original Guteza Salaysay was already afflicted with substantial and independent defects before Guteza ever recanted it: the supposed notary expressly denied under oath having notarized or signed it; the document was subsequently treated by the Executive Judge of Branch 18 of the RTC of Manila as a falsified document; and M. Bunagan and Colesio—persons Guteza himself identified as capable of corroborating his narrative—executed sworn statements contradicting him and denying the supposed deliveries.”

In 2025, the Manila RTC’s (regional trial court) executive judge cleared the named notary after a National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) examination found that the questioned signature and her standard signature were not written by the same person. The court referred the matter for further investigation.

The supplemental filing also recounts Guteza’s new allegations about the preparation of his first account.

“Guteza narrates that the supposed delivery narrative was raised during a meeting with former Congressman Mike Defensor, and that, despite his lack of personal knowledge of the matters being proposed, he was repeatedly pressed to adopt them. He further states that Defensor’s son-in-law thereafter reduced the proposed narrative into an affidavit on a laptop, and that sitting Senator Rodante Marcoleta subsequently reviewed and revised the document.

"According to Guteza, it was in the course of that process that Sen. Marcoleta described his proposed account as the 'missing link' that would connect me to the alleged deliveries,” it said.

The supplemental filing further underscored the importance of these attestations.

“These details do not compel automatic acceptance of every accusation Guteza now makes. They do, however, render his subsequent account capable of examination and testing, and prevent his former account from rationally being treated as a stable and independent evidentiary foundation without confronting the circumstances he now describes.”

Meanwhile, lawyer Antonio “Audie” Bucoy, a former House impeachment spokesperson, reckoned that Guteza's original testimony, along with the allegations of the remaining 14 "Maleta Boys", were no longer credible.

In an interview with DZMM radio over the weekend, Bucoy also claimed that the Ombudsman was resorting to “selective prosecution” and inexplicably targeting specifically the former Speaker.

Commenting on the Ombudsman’s claim that it has 42 witnesses against Romualdez, Bucoy said the issue is not the number of witnesses but the quality and credibility of testimonies.

“Hindi ho ito laban ng paramihan ng testigoy eh. Ito ho ay labanan ng kredibilidad at kalidad ng testigo. Ah gaya ho ng 18 (Maleta Boys), apat ang tumuligsa diyan. Pero pinanindigan nung apat kung bakit hindi totoo 'yung mga sinabi nila noon,” he said.

(This is not a contest over who has more witnesses. This is a battle of credibility and the quality of the witnesses. For example, there were 18 [Maleta Boys], and four of them denounced it. But those four stood by their accounts and explained why what they had said before was not true.)

He was referring to four Maleta Boys who have also withdrawn their original accusations against Romualdez.

Bucoy said the retraction of the four jibed with the assertions of 25 Maleta Boys’ colleagues who were former aides of ex-Ako Bicol party-list Rep. Zaldy Co and who have belied the allegations of the original 18 Maleta Boys.

But the most important retraction of all is Guteza's, Bucoy said. He pointed out that the 18 surfaced when Guteza suddenly disappeared days after his Senate testimony in September 2025.

“Kung maalala niyo, ang una hong lumutang diyan ay si Orly Guteza. Nung bigla siyang naglaho ng hindi pa siya nasusuri ng mahusay, lumutang bigla yung 18,” Bucoy added.

(If you recall, the first one to surface was Orly Guteza. When he suddenly disappeared before he could be properly examined, the 18 suddenly surfaced.)

“Eh yan ho ay magkakaugnay eh. Kung pinabulaanan na ni Orly Guteza yung kanyang unang salaysay at sinabing ito ay pinilit lamang sa kanya at merong panunuhol na kaakibat ito, dagdag pa natin yung sinabi nung 25 na tinuligsa rin yung 18, ano pang kalalabasan nito? Wala hong ebidensiya. Hindi kapani-paniwala yung natitira,” he said.

(These are all interconnected. If Orly Guteza has already denied his initial statement and said that he was merely forced to make it and that bribery was involved, and then we add what the 25 said, who also denounced the 18, what does this leave us with? There is no evidence. What remains is not credible.)

He contends that the Ombudsman is choosing which evidence to use against which official. As such, he said he finds it surprising that the Ombudsman finds certain evidence credible against Romualdez, but lacking in weight against other officials.

“Ang pinagtataka lang ho, ang aking personal na pagtataka, dahil ito ay sinusundan ko noon pa, ay bakit pinipili ng Ombudsman kung alin ang may kredibilidad, at alin ang wala. Pag ang tinutukoy na may pananagutan ay ang dating Speaker, sinasabi niya may kredibilidad,” the lawyer noted.

(What I find puzzling, my personal concern, because I have been following this for quite some time, is why the Ombudsman chooses which accounts are credible and which are not. When the person being accused of responsibility is the former Speaker, he says the account is credible.)