Any senator or witness who can produce a paper trail proving Senator Erwin Tulfo pocketed money from flood control projects will have his resignation the same day, the lawmaker declared Tuesday, July 8, staking his Senate seat on a challenge to his accusers.
“Pag may nakita ho kayong pangalan ko sa DPWH o sa listahan ni Cabral na sinasabi ni Congressman Leviste na tumanggap sa flood control,” Tulfo said. “Bitbitin n’yo sa Senado ang dokumento… at magre-resign ako immediately.”
The senator said he would call his own press conference to announce his departure should such records ever materialize. He pointed reporters toward the Department of Public Works and Highways and toward official allocation lists as the place any proof would have to come from, insisting no such entry bearing his name exists.
Pressed on how his name entered the controversy at all, Tulfo rejected the account given by several of the 18 former security personnel of ex-party-list representative Zaldy Co, some of whom reportedly named him among officials said to have benefited from the projects. He argued there was nothing tying him to any of it.
“Wala akong natanggap na pondo sa flood control, farm-to-market road o kung anumang kabulastugan na ‘yan,” he said. “Paano ako masasama doon eh wala naman ako sa flood control.”
Tulfo offered a theory for the timing: his appearance in early surveys for the 2028 presidential contest. He asked polling firms to strike both his name and that of his brother, Senator Raffy Tulfo, from their lists, saying neither intends to seek the presidency or the vice presidency.
Looking ahead, he laid out conditions for how the Senate probe would proceed once chamber sessions resume following President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s July 27 State of the Nation Address. Anyone wishing to testify, he said, must first put their claims in a sworn affidavit.
“Hindi naman puwedeng magturo lang kayo nang magturo,” he said.
Tulfo also signaled he would step aside from the inquiry if a majority of his colleagues wanted him to, and floated naming a subcommittee head to run it in his place. He batted away the suggestion that Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial was engineered to pull attention away from the flood control scandal, promising the investigation would run its full course.
“Hindi pa tapos ang imbestigasyon,” he said. “There will be no cover-up.”
