A senator’s warning that he could soon be taken into custody has drawn a flat clarification from the country’s police leadership: no such order exists in their hands.
Col. Allen Rae Co, who heads the Philippine National Police’s public information office, told reporters at Camp Crame on Monday that nothing has reached the organization directing officers to detain Sen. Rodante Marcoleta. “As of now, the Philippine National Police has not received any official communication regarding said warrant,” Co said, adding that the police stand ready to act once a valid order arrives. “Just like any other warrants, once we receive a warrant, just like any other warrant from a competent authority, we will implement,” he said.
The senator himself set off the speculation. Marcoleta said last week that he had been tipped off about a possible warrant, framing the prospect as something that could materialize at any moment. He has tied the threat to complaints accusing him of plunder and indirect bribery, both stemming from campaign money he allegedly never declared.
PNP chief Gen. Jose Melencio Nartatez Jr. reinforced his spokesman’s account in a separate statement, saying the force had issued no special operational instructions involving the senator and would not be guided by hearsay. According to Bombo Radyo, Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla went further still, telling reporters he knew of no criminal case lodged against Marcoleta at all — a necessary precondition, he noted, before any court could move to order an arrest.
The complaints trace back to a recommendation issued in May by the field investigation bureau of the Office of the Deputy Ombudsman for Luzon, which urged that plunder and indirect bribery charges be pursued. At the center of the matter is roughly ₱75 million in donations the senator is accused of leaving off both his disclosures to the Commission on Elections and his 2025 statement of assets, liabilities and net worth. The Inquirer reported that the contested sum was split among three contributors to his 2025 Senate run: former Quezon City Rep. Mike Defensor, Joseph Espiritu and Aristotle Viray.
Marcoleta has cast the entire effort as retaliation. He has said he intends to keep naming those he claims are entangled in the flood control corruption controversy, vowing that detention would not silence him, and has signaled he would surrender peacefully rather than resist should officers ever come for him.
Acting on the Ombudsman’s request, the Sandiganbayan last week placed the senator and his three alleged donors under a precautionary hold departure order, a measure that bars them from leaving the country while the matter remains unresolved.
