All 24 senators have already released to the public copies of their sworn statement of assets, liabilities and net worth, or SALN for short. The entire Senate of the 20th Congress voluntarily made public their respective SALNs. Actually, it’s the previous year’s financial status of the SALN declarant as of April 30, 2025.
The Senate has always been like a ‘millionaires’ club’ in terms of reported net worth. Or this is the difference between total assets (such as bank deposits, investments and cash-on-hand) minus total liabilities (such as loans and mortgages) equals net worth for the entire year.
Senate President Vicente ‘Tito’ Sotto III and Senator Risa Hontiveros were the early birds who released their SALNs. Through the Senate secretariat, the rest of the senators followed suit one after the other.
On the other hand, many of their House counterparts have yet to give the go-signal for the public release of their SALNs. So far, only newly installed Speaker Faustino ‘Bojie’ Dy III along with a dozen House members have so far released copies of their respective SALNs. Dy took over from ertswhile speaker Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez, who has yet to release a copy of his SALN.
While Sen. Francis ‘Chiz’ Escudero reported P18 million net worth, red flags were seen in his SALN. Escudero and Romualdez lost their respective leadership posts after being accused as being behind the congressional initiatives and insertions that went into anomalous transactions in the flood control projects in the 2025 budget law.
The Makabayan bloc at the House and other party-list leaders headed by Mamamayang Liberal (ML) party-list Rep. Leila de Lima and Akbayan party-list Rep. Chel Diokno were among the first to release to the public their individual SALNs. Navotas Rep. Toby Tiangco and Caloocan City Rep. Edgar Erice were the latest House members who opened their SALNs to the public.
As per Republic Act (RA) 6713, all state-paid officials and employees in the executive, legislative and judicial branches of the government are mandated to submit their SALN on or before April 30 each year.
The demand for access to the SALNs of public officials arouse amid the national outrage over the alleged ‘ghost’ flood control projects funded by the ‘proponents’ insertions in the budget of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH). Todate, at least three Senators, a number of House members 22 or so private contractors and top-ranking DPWH officials and district engineers are now facing corruption charges before the Ombudsman.
The public disclosures of SALNs came days after former justice secretary and now Ombudsman Crispin ‘Boying’ Remulla announced he has rescinded the previous directives of his immediate predecessor. A few days after he was appointed by President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr. (PBBM), one of Remulla’s first official acts was to relax the previous restrictions on public access to all SALNs deposited at the Office of the Ombudsman. However, Remulla specified that copies of SALNs will be provided with redacted versions only. This is, Remulla pointed out, to protect the rights of privacy of individual declarants and their respective family members.
How about the right to life for the many lives lost due to non-existent flood control projects that could have protected them during typhoon-related flooding and landslides?
It was the ombudsman of former president Rodrigo Duterte, retired justice Samuel Martires, who imposed the public access restrictions. Martires previously served as one of the justices at the Sandiganbayan for 12 years. Ex-president Duterte tapped Martires, his schoolmate at the San Beda College of Law, to become associate justice of the Supreme Court (SC) in March 2017. Martires opted for early retirement from the SC after he was appointed ombudsman on July 26, 2018.
On Sept. 15, 2020, Martires issued Memorandum Circular No. 1 which restricted public access to SALNs. The ombudsman issued this circular that significantly limited public access by requiring requests to be made by the official, through a court order, or by the ombudsman’s own investigators.
Martires justified the restrictions on SALNs supposedly to prevent unscrupulous parties from ‘weaponizing’ it to attack those in the government service. Martires insisted SALN declarants can invoke this law to protect themselves if it is used as tools of public-shaming to besmirch their integrity and reputation.
The SC affirmed restrictions on access to SALNs through its ruling on July 1, 2021 that dismissed the first legal challenge to the ombudsman’s 2020 memorandum. The SC upheld that public access to SALNs is ‘not an absolute vested right.’
The SALN law was signed on Feb. 20, 1989 by the late president Corazon Aquino. On the other hand, the Data Privacy Act under RA 10173 was signed into law by the late president Benigno ‘PNoy’ Aquino III on Aug. 15, 2012. The aim is to protect personal data in information and communications systems in both private and government sectors.
Obviously, the Data Privacy Act of 2012 came out later than the SALN Law in 1989 under RA 6713.
As then head of this constitutional anti-graft body, Martires issued his memo that effectively superseded the very law that empowered the Office of the Ombudsman to review SALNs as the starting point of lifestyle check. Thus, Remulla, who has a term of seven years as ombudsman, must use the SALNs to conduct lifestyle checks motu proprio.
As of this writing, both Malacañang and the judiciary have yet to respond to transparency calls for public disclosure on SALNs. Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin echoed the sentiments of Martires in favor of maintaining restrictions. Bersamin argued that the rights to privacy of SALN declarants must be balanced with the public’s right to know.
Ex-president Duterte appointed Bersamin as SC chief justice in 2018 before the latter retired a year later. So Bersamin and Martires served together at the SC in 2017, albeit for a brief period only. No wonder Bersamin and Martires are singing the same tune, along with ex-Marcos Cabinet colleague now Ombudsman Remulla.