Bonoan says he relied on Cabral for flood control data

Former Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) secretary Manuel Bonoan said Monday that he relied on information on flood control projects submitted by his staffers, especially by the office of late DPWH undersecretary Maria Catalina Cabral. 

Bonoan said this during the resumption of Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on the allegedly anomalous flood control projects, as he was being pressed to shed light on the supposed wrong grid coordinates that were submitted and listed on the Sumbong sa Pangulo website.

“Mr. Chair, of course I relied on the data that was generated by our people in the department, especially the office of the late undersecretary Cathy Cabral, especially the initial,” Bonoan said. 

“The submitted data are actually from the consolidated data by the late undersecretary Cabral. So, nandon po ‘yung mga MYPS (Multi-Year Planning and Scheduling) data,” he added. 

Bonoan said the DPWH hurriedly submitted to the Office of the President in August 2025 a list of over 9,000 completed flood control projects from July 2022 up to May 2025, following President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s fourth State of the Nation Address. 

“Truth of the matter is, because of the time constraint that we have to submit, I instructed the late undersecretary Cabral to collate the information we need to submit to the Office of the President, and because the planning service has a record of projects that had been completed already under the MYPS,” he said. 

Incorrect grid coordinates

Senate President Pro Tempore Panfilo “Ping” Lacson, chairman of the committee, alleged last Wednesday that Bonoan deliberately submitted to Malacañang incorrect grid coordinates for thousands of flood control projects nationwide. 

The senator said that the submission of wrong data resulted in “grossly inaccurate data” involving some 421 ghost flood control projects. 

Bonoan, in return, said that the 421 ghost projects were “mind-boggling” for him. 

“When I learned about the report that there were actually about 421 potential ghost projects, it's already a mind-boggling information to me. I have never ever, well, anything about these kinds of ghost projects. You see, if there would be that many ghost projects, I was wondering why, would this not mean naipa-ano na ng COA sa departamento?” Bonoan asked. 

“Because yearly, Mr. Chairman, the COA would like to submit to us actually their observation report. And 421 potential ghost projects as reported is really mind-boggling to me, a number of that sort all over the country,” he added. 

According to the ex-DPWH chief, the only potential ghost projects he reported to Marcos were those reported to the former in the Bulacan First Engineering District.

“My statement to the President is that, ‘I hope Mr. President that this is an isolated case.’ Because there has not been any other report that reached me, including in Bulacan area where there are three engineering districts. It could’ve been a pattern actually in that district. You can imagine, there's only one that has reported presence of ghost project,” Bonoan explained. 

LIVE UPDATES: Senate hearing into flood control projects (Jan. 19, 2026)

Trimmed down to 416

Meanwhile, DPWH Undersecretary Arthur Bisnar, said that upon verification and cross-checking, the 421 reported ghost projects were trimmed down to 416 due to five duplicates. 

Of these 416 projects, he said 287 were MYPS coordinates and 129 were MYPS and Infratrack coordinates. 

He further noted that 337 projects were tagged as non-existent or ghost upon inspection by the DPWH engineers and other agencies. 

“Out of the supposedly 421, na-trimmed down to 416, ito ay initially pinuntahan na ng AFP, PNP, ng DepDev at chineck nila. Dahil wala silang nakita dahil mali ang coordinates, ni-report nila as non-existent,” Bisnar explained. 

(Out of the supposedly 421 ghost projects, which were trimmed down to 416, these were initially visited and checked by the AFP, PNP, and DepDev. Since they didn't see anything because the coordinates were wrong, they reported it as non-existent.) 

Lacson said that if wrong grid coordinates were indeed submitted, the number of ghost projects might have actually “ballooned.” — RSJ, GMA Integrated News