House Majority Leader Manuel Jose Dalipe on Tuesday said the House of Representatives will continue its key committee investigations even as the legislative body is set to begin next week’s committee deliberations on the proposed P6.352-trillion national budget for 2025.
Such probes will include those on extrajudicial killings (EJKs) related to the previous administration’s drug war and violence linked to Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs).
“I was spoken to yesterday by some of our committee chairmen who conduct hearings and they were asking guidance because usually in the previous years, we would hold all other hearings when the budget is presented to us and we would concentrate on the budget,” Dalipe said in a mix of English and Filipino.
However, he noted that committee chairpersons had requested to continue their hearings as they are now in the process of hearing important resource persons and gathering vital information to complete their investigations.
“Our committee chairmen are asking that they be allowed to continue your committee hearings. Committee hearing rooms used to be our problem. We are always running out of committee hearing rooms, but thankfully this year we have new spaces for committee hearings,” Dalipe said.
Following the directive from Speaker Ferdinand Martin G. Romualdez, additional spaces, particularly in the new building at the Batasang Pambansa Complex, have been made available for committee use.
Dalipe said that Secretary General Reginald Velasco had already been instructed to make available the other spaces, especially in the new building, to the various committees presently conducting probes. This arrangement allows for parallel hearings, such as both budget deliberations and critical investigations.
