Criminal charges tied to the ornamental cauldron built for the 2019 Southeast Asian Games could be filed within a week, according to National Bureau of Investigation Director Melvin Matibag, who said the agency has assembled enough evidence to move forward.
“Within the next few days, perhaps within a week, we will be filing cases,” Matibag told a forum held in Quezon City over the weekend.
The cauldron matter is being treated as one strand of a wider inquiry into the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee, or PHISGOC. Matibag said his office broke the sprawling probe into smaller, separate cases to make prosecution manageable, given the volume of records and witness accounts involved. “We divided this into pieces so we can file cases. There will be different cases coming out. The cauldron is another case. That might be the first one,” he said.
At the center of the cauldron case is a pricing discrepancy. Investigators have gathered paperwork indicating the structure was billed at P55 million, though Matibag said its real cost was closer to P5 million.
The bureau’s attention extends beyond the cauldron itself. Several heads of national sports associations are under scrutiny, and some have already reported to the NBI after being served subpoenas. Among the individuals named by Matibag is sports official Ramon Suzara. He added that a number of people who sat on PHISGOC had ties to Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano—who chaired the committee in 2019—whether as former colleagues, staff, or associates. The NBI, Matibag said, is tracing the business interests of figures linked to the senator. “We are still developing and checking what ventures they are involved in,” he said.
Another open question for investigators is why PHISGOC has kept backing international competitions long after its mandate expired. The committee was formed for the single purpose of running the 2019 Games and was expected to dissolve once they concluded. “It was supposed to end its existence after the SEA Games. But we found out that until now, they are still sponsoring international events. We are looking into that,” Matibag said.
Documents and testimony collected so far, Matibag said, are strong enough to sustain criminal complaints as the bureau continues building its separate cases.
