Ferdinand Martin Romualdez will remain barred from leaving the country after the Sandiganbayan turned down his attempt to undo a travel restriction tied to the multibillion-peso flood control investigation he is entangled in.
The anti-graft court’s Seventh Division, in a 12-page resolution dated June 1 and released to the public on Wednesday, refused to set aside the precautionary hold departure order (PHDO) that has kept the Leyte lawmaker and former House Speaker within Philippine borders since late April.
Part of the court’s reasoning rested on procedure. The justices noted that Romualdez’s motion for reconsideration lacked the verification required under the rules, leaving his pleading unsigned and, on that basis alone, without legal standing.
But the bench went further, weighing the substance of his arguments and finding them wanting. Romualdez had pressed the court to recognize his right to travel, contending that the order had no factual footing because investigators had yet to conduct a preliminary inquiry and because nothing showed he was inclined to flee. He pointed to his having requested travel clearance from the House and his formal notice to the Bureau of Immigration, coursed through the Department of Justice, as proof of his openness and his intent to come back promptly.
The justices were not persuaded. Writing for the division, Associate Justice Lorifel Lacap Pahimna explained the purpose behind such an order. “It is not superfluous to restate that the essence of [a] PHDO is to address flight risk during preliminary investigation before the issuance of a warrant of arrest or a hold departure order,” she wrote, in a resolution joined by Associate Justices Georgina Hidalgo and Hans Chester Nocom.
The court tied that flight-risk concern directly to what Romualdez stands to lose. Given the seriousness of the accusations and the prospect of imprisonment, heavy fines, and the forfeiture of property, the justices concluded he had both reason and means to slip beyond the reach of authorities if permitted to depart.
Romualdez had framed his requested trip as a medical necessity, citing a follow-up angioplasty consultation with his physician in Singapore that he described as long overdue. The court found that claim unsupported, observing that he produced no medical records, no medical abstract, and no confirmed appointment to back it up, nor any history of similar trips predating the controversy now surrounding him.
The order itself dates to April 22, when the Seventh Division granted the Office of the Ombudsman’s application to bar his departure. The complaints against him remain at the preliminary investigation stage, meaning he has not yet been formally charged in court. He faces allegations of plunder, graft, money laundering, and both direct and indirect bribery.
Romualdez has rejected the accusations throughout, characterizing them as products of intrigue rather than evidence and arguing that spending decisions over the national budget never rested with the Speaker alone.
“It ensures orderly administration of justice bound by due process without rendering the investigation and the rules inutile,” the resolution stated, before concluding that the motion was “denied for lack of merit.”
According to the Ombudsman, Romualdez served as the supposed architect of a kickback arrangement built around flood control projects, with the diverted sums pegged at roughly P56 billion.
The denial lands amid a widening prosecutorial push. Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon told reporters on Wednesday that the Ombudsman intends to lodge fresh charges Thursday before the Malolos Regional Trial Court against several figures in Bulacan, including what he called a “big fish” whose identity he declined to reveal. The week prior, on May 28, prosecutors brought plunder and graft charges against Senator Jinggoy Estrada over an alleged P573 million in kickbacks drawn from 2025 flood control allocations; he has been held at a Quezon City detention facility since June 1 on the non-bailable plunder count despite posting bail on the graft charge.
