Senator Alan Peter Cayetano on Thursday called on Sen. Nancy Binay to tell the “whole truth” as he discovered many things were allegedly concealed from him over the construction costs of the New Senate Building (NSB), which he tagged as “so far, the country’s most expensive building.”
“Who were hiding (them)? Why were they hiding them? I haven’t gotten into that,” said Cayetano, hinting at possible irregularities involved in developing the project. He also questioned if these people, whom he did not name, were blatantly lying or just not speaking to them.
Insisting on transparency, Cayetano stressed that lying is not only “not telling you the truth but also telling half-truth and holding the truth—you do not come out with the whole truth.”
He likewise told the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to do the same thing, saying this is just a review and they wanted to come out with a technical decision this coming August.
He also acknowledged that further delay in years or months may mean added cost due to inflation.
Under the new Senate leadership, Cayetano took over the position of Binay as chairperson of the Senate Committee on Accounts, which oversees the construction of the NSB.
Binay pegged the NSB budgetary cost at P8.9 billion, but upon review, Cayetano found the cost spiked to P23 billion.
During a previous Senate hearing on the issue, Cayetano said the building cost could even reach P25 to P27 billion, which are even conservative estimates.
Cayetano said he obtained caches of documents on the construction of the NSB, but he is yet to go through them.
Initially, he cited the facade of the building, which cost rose to P1 billion from 498 million; now, it is pegged at P2.9 billion. He said there was also another building design, which was not mentioned.
“I do not know why many are reacting that way—either frozen, or peddling lies about us, or political attachment,” said Cayetano.
According to Cayetano, he will consult Senate President Francis Escudero, who had ordered him to review the construction of NSB due to the huge surge in the cost.
Meanwhile, Cayetano said that while he is open to a conciliation process with Binay over the latter’s ethics complaint against him, this is just secondary to his ongoing review of the budget cost of the NSB.
Senate Majority Leader Francis Tolentino earlier said he would put Cayetano and Binay through a conciliation meeting in response to the latter’s ethics complaint to resolve their dispute regarding the NSB issue.
