Leviste: Each congressman has at least P150M in budget insertions, Cabral files show

1 month ago 24

Upgrade to High-Speed Internet for only ₱1499/month!

Enjoy up to 100 Mbps fiber broadband, perfect for browsing, streaming, and gaming.

Visit Suniway.ph to learn

December 22, 2025 | 3:33pm

MANILA, Philippines — Rep. Leandro Leviste (Batangas, 1st District) claimed Monday, December 22, that each district and party-list representative has at least P150 million in budget insertions under the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) each year.

Based on a document he said he obtained from former DPWH Undersecretary Maria Catalina Cabral, Leviste said that several public officials from Congress to the executive submit millions to billions worth of DPWH projects as early as the president’s budget is prepared.

He called the alleged P150-million budget insertion from House lawmakers a “basic allocation” or a “standard” that the DPWH has been implementing over the past years.

“‘Yan ang minimum ng bawat isa. Pero may mga isa na daan-daan, milyon o bilyon. At ang P150 ang standard bawat congressman pati party-list representative,” Leviste said in an interview over dzBB.

He also claimed that members of the executive branch would insert “tens of billions” into the agency’s budget, adding that other alleged proponents included private individuals and senators.

Although Leviste spoke out after Cabral’s death, he has held back the documents, leaving it to DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon to decide on their disclosure. He also wishes not to upset all of Congress should he publicize them.

But what specifically is Leviste claiming aside from the P150 million minimum insertion?

What the 'Cabral files' are for

While these may sound like accusations, the lawmaker clarified that budget insertions are not inherently illegal or improper.

The main issue here, he said, is whether an official’s insertion personally benefited them or their relatives — as is the case with flood control contractors linked to Congress.

“Ano ang relasyon ng proponent sa eventual contractor kung sila ba ay, for example, campaign donor o kaibigan? Na search ba ng gobyerno kung may financial transaction involved?” he pointed out over 105.9 True FM.

The new pork. In the 2025 National Expenditure Program, Leviste said that P401 billion of the DPWH budget consisted of “allocables” divided among district congressmen according to a formula reportedly known only to Cabral.

According to the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, Cabral described an allocable as the “ceiling budget” for each engineering office.

Lawmakers then get to choose projects from a list that reaches this ceiling, sometimes asking for more than the limit, with Cabral ultimately deciding the final allocation to be seen in the National Expenditure Program (NEP).

Cabral's formula. The computation, known as the “BBM parametric formula,” Leviste said, was based on several factors, including a district’s population, poverty incidence and disaster recovery capacity.

That was what Cabral told him, but Leviste said the numbers don’t seem to add up since smaller provinces are given bigger allocations compared to larger areas.

Former DPWH Undersecretary Roberto Bernardo also mentioned the existence of these allocables and the formula in a sworn affidavit, alleging Cabral had set aside portions for her and former Public Works Secretary Manuel Bonoan.

Aside from a lawmaker’s allocables, Leviste claimed that a whopping P320 billion in budget insertions existed outside the formula, including submissions from members of the executive branch, private individuals, congressmen and senators.

Senators alone, he said, accounted for P21 billion in insertions. When asked if his mother, Sen. Loren Legarda, was included, Leviste said the document indicated that “all” senators were.

He said Legarda told him she never spoke with Cabral about any insertions, leading him to suspect that some lawmakers’ names might have been included in the insertions without their knowledge.

The most important question

While Cabral prepared the DPWH budgets, he also stated that the more important question is who instructed her to create the pork-like “allocables” and offer them to public officials to submit any insertions.

The undisclosed document, Leviste said, is an Excel spreadsheet containing hundreds of pages of more than 17,000 line items and 15 tabs.

With Cabral’s sudden death and lapses uncovered in preserving evidence, several House minority members have filed a resolution seeking to conduct an investigation themselves.

Read Entire Article