MANILA, Philippines — Senate President Vicente Sotto III said a draft committee report is not official and cannot be made public, following a petition seeking full disclosure of the blue ribbon committee’s report on anomalous flood control projects.
In a message to reporters on Thursday, Sotto expressed confidence that the Blue Ribbon Committee, headed by Senate President Pro Tempore Panfilo Lacson, would know how to handle such petitions.
“It’s a draft and therefore not official. If the other committee members have not even read or seen it, it cannot be made public. They met yesterday [and] agreed on how the committee report may be filed,” Sotto said.
On February 4, lawyer Eldrige Marvin Aceron, together with lawyers Sikini Labastilla and Purificacion Bartolome-Bernabe, filed a petition seeking full disclosure of the draft committee report of the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee on the flood control projects investigation.
In the seven-page petition, Aceron argued that the media had published the draft report and that reports had already emerged that three senators—Sen. JV Ejercito, Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri, and Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian—withdrew their signatures from the draft panel report.