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Dizon vs. Leviste: Flash Drive Heist or Budget Bombshell? Philippines’ Wildest Political Thriller Unfolds!

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Louis ‘Barok’ Biraogo

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Dizon vs. Leviste: Flash Drive Heist or Budget Bombshell? Philippines’ Wildest Political Thriller Unfolds!
The Great Flash Drive Caper: Did Leviste ‘Borrow’ the Files or Just Help Himself to DPWH’s Dirty Laundry?

By Louis ‘Barok‘ C. Biraogo — December 31, 2025

IN THE Philippines, the only thing more flooded than our streets after a mild drizzle is the national budget with suspicious “allocables.” Enter our two protagonists in this holiday-season farce: Batangas Rep. Leandro Leviste, the self-anointed whistleblower wielding a hard drive like Excalibur, and Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) Secretary Vince Dizon, the unflappable technocrat issuing denials faster than his department builds ghost dikes. Hovering between them? The ghost of the late Undersecretary Maria Catalina Cabral, whose untimely plunge into a Benguet ravine on December 18 left behind files that now threaten to drown the entire Marcos-era infrastructure circus.

What exquisite timing: Cabral resigns in September amid the flood control kickback probes, falls to her death just before Christmas, and on December 24—while the nation stuffs itself with lechon—Leviste starts drip-feeding the “Cabral files” to the public. By Christmas Day, he’s unleashed spreadsheets tallying P3.5 trillion in DPWH allocations from 2023-2026, complete with regional feasts for Central Luzon (P406.9 billion), Calabarzon (P341.8 billion), and Bicol (P272.3 billion) (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 30 Dec. 2025). Unprogrammed appropriations? A cozy P213.8 billion slush fund. It’s the Theatre of the Absurd, Philippine edition: a scandal over flood control funds that could flood the political landscape with indictments, all gift-wrapped with posthumous leaks and a side of conspiracy whispers.

“Silent night, holy leak—shepherds quake at the sight of 3.5 trillion pesos in swaddling pork.”

The Whistleblower vs. The Technocrat: A Duel in Denials

Picture this Kabuki dance: Leviste, the freshman congressman with renewable-energy billions in his pocket, claims an “agent” of Dizon called him, dangling his own district’s allocations like a carrot to buy silence. Dizon? He categorically denies everything—insertions, allocables, even seeing the files. The DPWH cries foul, accusing Leviste of “forcefully and illegally” snatching the data from a staffer’s computer. Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) piles on: no discretionary funds here, folks; everything’s above board, audited, and treasury-released.

Malacañang calls for a probe into how Leviste got the goods, while the Office of the Ombudsman dutifully examines the CPU. Leviste insists Cabral handed them over in September, allegedly on Dizon’s orders for “transparency.” Dizon retorts he’s never authenticated a thing. It’s grotesque comedy: one side posturing as hero, the other as victim, with the timing—post-Cabral’s death, mid-yuletide cheer—reeking of either heroic martyrdom or calculated opportunism. In this duel, the only clear winner is public cynicism.

Forensic File Analysis: The Cabral Corpus Delicti

Beyond the he-said-she-said spectacle lies the authenticity war. Is this a heroic leak sanctioned by a now-silenced undersecretary, or a felony data heist from a grieving department? Leviste waves the “public interest” flag, claiming the files expose proponents from lawmakers to cabinet secretaries to private contractors. Dizon and Palace call it hearsay without probative value—unauthenticated, possibly manipulated.

But substance over spectacle: If genuine, these P3.5 trillion breakdowns reveal anomalies screaming for scrutiny. Why do certain regions gorge while others starve? Those “unprogrammed appropriations” smell like the post-Belgica pork barrel phoenix—risen from the Supreme Court’s 2013 ashes that torched the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) for violating separation of powers and allowing post-enactment legislator meddling. Here, executive-led “allocables” during budget preparation could be Belgica 2.0: the hydra grows an executive head, letting contractors and officials feast before Congress even deliberates.

Legal Thunderdome: Pathways to Perdition

For Dizon and the executive: If the files hold water, we’re staring at violations of Republic Act No. 3019 (Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act)—graft via unwarranted benefits, manifest partiality in contracts grossly disadvantageous to the government. Add constitutional carnage: Article VI, Section 25 of the 1987 Philippine Constitution bans executive re-appropriations or transfers without congressional nod. This could trigger a crisis if proven as executive rigging of the National Expenditure Program (NEP), reviving the unconstitutional pork system but with the Palace pulling strings. Potential breaches of Republic Act No. 9184 (Government Procurement Reform Act) in procurement loom as well.

For Leviste, the “noble” whistleblower: Does public interest shield him from Republic Act No. 10175 (Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012)‘s illegal access provisions? Or the Revised Penal Code’s seizure of secrets? House ethics probes for unparliamentary conduct loom if he’s deemed a hacker rather than hero. One wrong forensic finding on chain of custody, and the savior becomes the accused.

The Shadow Play: Rumors, Ghosts, and Ghost Projects

Darker subtexts lurk. Cabral’s death—ruled accidental by blunt trauma from a fall, positive for antidepressants, no foul play per autopsy and Philippine National Police (PNP)—fuels inevitable whispers. Why the sudden ravine plunge amid probes into her role in allocations? Leviste alleges a contractor-legislator-executive triumvirate, naming figures like “Gardiola” who allegedly “ordered” insertions. That mysterious “agent” call to Leviste? Intrigue thickens: leverage, threats, or fabrication? And the broader flood control mess—kickbacks returned, officials dismissed—suggests the files are just the tip of a rotten iceberg.

Systemic Autopsy: The Rot in the Machine

This isn’t about two men ego-wrestling; it’s a scalpel slicing open the chronic carcinoma of Philippine corruption. The budget-as-banquet culture persists: allocations feasted upon by the connected, not planned for the public. Hollow anti-corruption slogans from the Marcos camp ring faker than a DPWH “completed” ghost project. From the old PDAF scams to today’s “allocables,” the hydra regenerates—now perhaps executive-flavored. Belgica killed congressional pork; has it merely migrated to unprogrammed slush and discretionary flood funds?

Endgames & Fallout: From Sanction to Silenced

Scenarios abound: An Ombudsman forensic audit vindicates Leviste, unleashing Sandiganbayan hell—resignations, prosecutions, mass disqualifications. Or a whitewash buries the files as inauthentic, slapping Leviste with defamation or cyber charges. Most likely? A compromise retreat, system untouched, public numbed by yet another fizzle.

Impacts? Political carnage if real: DPWH trust collapses, budget process exposed as rigged, Marcos anti-graft narrative drowned. Or cynical stasis: another scandal evaporates, rot deepens.

Enough with the theater. I demand the Office of the Ombudsman, empowered under Republic Act No. 6770 (The Ombudsman Act of 1989), wield teeth: full digital forensics, televised hearings. Unleash the Commission on Audit (COA) on every allocation on ghost projects. Prosecute the guilty with ruinous fury; eviscerate false accusers likewise. Public, shed your apathy: this flood of corruption threatens to swallow us all. Demand the autopsy now, or prepare to drown in the next one.

May your New Year be free of unprogrammed appropriations—and may the guilty drown in their own allocations.

  • —Barok, toasting with a glass of untreated water
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Louis ‘Barok‘ C. Biraogo

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