A jail cell at the New Quezon City Jail along Payatas Road is now the designated place of detention for former House Speaker Martin Romualdez after the Sandiganbayan Third Division released a commitment order directing his transfer to the facility, even as he remains admitted at a San Juan City hospital.
Whether Romualdez actually moves anytime soon depends on a hearing the anti-graft court set for Thursday, September 10. On the table is his own plea, formally titled a Manifestation of Hospital Confinement and Urgent Motion Ad Cautelam for Continued Hospital Confinement Under Custody, to keep receiving treatment at Cardinal Santos Medical Center rather than report to a jail. Third Division Clerk of Court Dennis Pulma confirmed to The Manila Times that the session was scheduled for 8:30 a.m.
The court has been emphatic about where authority over the Leyte lawmaker now sits. “It must be emphasized that the custody of accused Romualdez belongs to the court,” the Third Division stated in its order, adding that it alone is positioned to weigh whether his health justifies staying in a hospital bed or reporting to a detention cell.
To decide that question, the justices summoned Romualdez’s four attending physicians — Rody Dy, Rogelio Libarnes, Kurt Allen Sibayan and Rosalio Torres — to testify and to turn over the findings of every medical test he underwent during his admission. According to Pulma, the subpoenas went out the day before the hearing. Romualdez himself was told to show up “should (his) condition permit,” though the PNP relayed that his camp submitted a certification declaring him medically unfit to travel.
His motion listed a lengthy roster of ailments as grounds for staying put, among them hypertensive atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, unstable angina, coronary artery disease, cerebrovascular ischemic disease, Type 2 diabetes, hypertension, dyslipidemia and primary hypothyroidism. He checked into Cardinal Santos on Monday night, roughly an hour after the warrant for his arrest came out, citing what his side described as a cardiovascular event and an anxiety attack.
Prosecutors are pushing back hard. Assistant Ombudsman Mico Clavano said the government will resist the hospital-detention bid and wants more than a lone physician weighing in. “The prosecutors will strongly oppose the motion. In fact, the prosecutors will ask that not just one doctor but a team of government doctors assess whether or not the illnesses declared need confinement or can be managed outside of the hospital,” Clavano said. Should those examinations conclude his conditions can be handled without a hospital, prosecutors intend to press for his immediate move to a regular detention facility, as would apply to any defendant in a non-bailable case.
Custody of Romualdez currently rests with the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, which served the warrant Monday evening and later returned it to the court. Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla said police plan to file their own motion asking that Romualdez be moved to the PNP General Hospital at Camp Crame while still under observation. “That will be our initial step under formal custody. We will give him visitation and practicing rights, including his doctors,” Remulla told a briefing, noting that immediate family and lawyers may also see him. He described Camp Crame’s facility as better equipped for a patient who sustained a transient ischemic attack in July 2026 and whose blood pressure has been unsteady, logged most recently at 148/82.
The charges stem from the Ombudsman’s plunder complaint against Romualdez, fugitive former Ako Bicol Rep. Zaldy Co and two others. Prosecutors accuse Romualdez and Co of collecting commissions, kickbacks and other payouts on at least 15 separate occasions, with the alleged take reaching roughly P7.44 billion. Investigators tie the money to contractors and firms with stakes in flood-control and infrastructure work bankrolled through national budgets from 2022 to 2025.
Through counsel Ade Fajardo, Romualdez has said he respects the legal process and will respond to the accusations in keeping with the law.
