Former Bulacan District Engineer Henry Alcantara has claimed that House Appropriations Committee Chair Zaldy Co facilitated billions of pesos worth of projects for Bulacan from 2022 to 2025, in exchange for a percentage cut from each allocation.

According to Alcantara, he first met Co in September 2021 during a meeting at Shangri-La, Bonifacio Global City. It was there, he said, that they discussed bringing in funding for Bulacan projects. “About a month later, I submitted a proposal on flood control projects. These eventually appeared in the 2022 General Appropriations Act, amounting to ₱519 million for six projects,” Alcantara recounted.

From 2022 to 2025, Co allegedly pushed for at least 426 projects in Bulacan, valued at no less than ₱35 billion. Alcantara broke down the funding as follows:

• 2022: ₱519 million (six flood control projects)
• 2023: ₱570 million under the National Expenditure Program (NEP); ₱3.25 billion in the bicameral conference committee (BICAM); ₱3.89 billion under “UA” insertions; total ₱12 billion
• 2024: ₱524 million in NEP; ₱5.084 billion in BICAM; ₱3.306 billion in UA; total ₱14.19 billion
• 2025: ₱7.385 billion in NEP only

Alcantara alleged that Co initially asked for a 20% commission per project in 2022, but the demand rose to 25% from 2023 to 2025. He added that payments to Co were not always made in full upfront but were often staggered, depending on how the projects were inserted into the budget.

The revelations come as Congress faces heightened scrutiny over alleged “pork barrel”-type insertions in infrastructure allocations. Co has yet to issue a response to Alcantara’s latest claims.