MANILA, Philippines — National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Director Melvin Matibag on Tuesday told the Senate impeachment court he was “100 percent” certain that Vice President Sara Duterte hired a hitman to carry out the alleged killings of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., first lady Liza Araneta-Marcos and former speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez.
The statement came during the interpellation of Senator-judge Bam Aquino, who asked Matibag for his professional assessment on the probability that Duterte had indeed spoken to someone, even as the NBI’s investigation remains open.
Aquino said that an ongoing investigation could still lead to different conclusions and asked Matibag to assign a percentage to the likelihood that Duterte had actually contacted a person to carry out the killings.
In response, Matibag said the NBI task force in charge of investigating the alleged threats of Duterte against the president, was already close to identifying the hired killler to carry out the deed should anything happen to her.
"Based on the statements made by the vice president herself, we are very sure she contracted somebody," Matibag said.
"We are 100 percent sure…because she herself stated her plan that she has contracted somebody to kill and that killer agreed to do what she asked based on their conversation," he added.
Prior to this, Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian asked Matibag if they already have a specific personality whom they believed Duterte supposedly hired to execute the kill plot against the Marcos family.
Matibag said they have identified several persons of interest who may been contacted by the vice president to execute the kill plot.
"For now we have a list of persons of interests, we are considering one of the persons in that list as the very person who we believe is the specific person the vice president talked to," Matibag said.
Matibag said the vice president's alleged grave threats was a matter concerning national security.
"VP Sara Duterte’s threat is not merely a threat but a plot to assassinate the President. It can be considered a threat to national security," Matibag said.
Following Matibag's statements, the defense panel said it has yet to decide whether to call Matibag as its own witness after he told the Senate impeachment court he would also be willing to testify for the defense if requested.
Speaking at a press briefing after the eighth day of the impeachment trial, Defense spokesman Michael Wesley Poa said the panel has not yet discussed the possibility because the prosecution has yet to complete the presentation of all the articles of impeachment and the defense remains weeks away from presenting its case.
"As of now, we haven't discussed it because we still don't know when our presentation will be. The agreement is to finish all the articles first, and then we will present our case. If that changes, then perhaps we'll need to talk about that," Poa said.
Earlier in the day, Matibag acknowledged during cross-examination that he met with members of the House prosecution panel before taking the witness stand, explaining that the discussion was limited to the scope of his testimony. The NBI chief also said he appeared before the impeachment court at the prosecution's request and would likewise be willing to testify if invited by the defense.
Poa said the defense raised Matibag's meeting with prosecutors only to determine whether his testimony had been "rehearsed," stressing that the NBI chief had explained the purpose of the meeting and that the defense was not suggesting any impropriety in the discussion itself.
Actionable intelligence
Matibag confirmed there was actionable intelligence on danger to the president's life.
"That is correct," Matibag said in Filipino, replying Sen. Risa Hontiveros who asked if the NBI had such actionable intelligence.
"In fact, the threats to the president that we monitor expanded further," he said, adding that it was very easy for ordinary people to issue a "threat."
Hontiveros asked whether the NBI had a similar actionable intelligence as to Duterte.
"...if we summarize it, there is actionable intelligence that there is a continuing danger to the life of the president but there is no actionable intelligence yet that there is also a threat to the life of the vice president?"
"That is clear...," Matibag said.
He said the NBI's mandate included "protecting the security of the president, of the vice president, of the Senate president, of the speaker of the House, and chief justice so if there is no task force, our monitoring continues."
'Senate trial is proper venue for full presentation of evidence'
Meanwhile, the prosecution panel rejected claims that it impeachedDuterte first before searching for evidence, saying that the Constitution assigns distinct roles to the House and the Senate in the impeachment process.
House prosecutor and Akbayan Party-list Rep. Jose Manuel Tadeo “Chel” Diokno and legal spokesman Benjamin “Jay” Tolosa Jr. issued the statement after Davao City Rep. Paolo Duterte questioned why the prosecution sought Senate subpoenas for the bank and Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) records of the vice president and her husband, lawyer Manases Carpio, after the Articles of Impeachment had been transmitted.
In a Facebook post written in Bisaya, Rep. Duterte reportedly portrayed the sequence as impeachment followed only afterward by a search for supporting documents.
But Diokno and Tolosa said the House had already gathered sufficient evidence to approve the Articles of Impeachment, while the Senate impeachment trial is the proper constitutional forum for the full presentation, examination, and testing of that evidence
Diokno said that characterization confused the House Committee on Justice’s probable-cause inquiry with the full trial conducted by the Senate impeachment court.
Under the Constitution, the House initiates impeachment cases and determines whether the allegations should proceed to trial.
The Senate, on the other hand, has the sole power to try and decide the Articles of Impeachment, with the prosecution and defense presenting their respective evidence before the senator-judges.
"When the impeachment complaint entered the House Committee on Justice, the panel’s duty is to find if there’s probable cause," Diokno said.
He said the committee was not expected to conduct the equivalent of the Senate trial or present every piece of evidence that might later become relevant.
"It is not our duty to search every evidence and conduct a trial, because it is the Senate’s mandate to conduct a trial," Diokno said.
"So, if you noticed, only a portion of the evidence was actually shown to the Justice Committee," he added.
'Scrap of paper'
The defense assailed the prosecution's use of a document attributed to self-confessed Davao Death Squad hitman Arturo Lascañas, calling it "a mere scrap of paper" because it was unsigned and unnotarized.
Defense counsel lawyer Mark Vinluan objected to the presentation of the document Matibag, arguing that the prosecution could not allow its witness to build his testimony on a document that lacked both a valid signature and notarization.
After Senate Presiding officer Francis "Chiz" Escudero asked whether the pre-marked document was notarized, prosecutor Gerville Luistro admitted that it was not, prompting Escudero to clarify that it was "not even an affidavit but merely a statement" because it was neither subscribed nor made under oath.
Matibag said that law enforcement agencies used such documents as open-source intelligence to generate leads, saying the Lascañas document formed part of an open, continuing and active investigation and was valuable in directing investigators toward evidence that still needed to be verified.
Escudero then clarified for the senator-judges that the document was being identified only to establish that it had been used during the NBI's investigation and not to prove the truth of the allegations it contained.
Vinluan further argued that the purported signature appeared to be only a photocopy and therefore did not qualify as an authentic signature.
Challenge
Duterte has yet to direct her legal team to challenge before the Supreme Court the Senate impeachment court's ruling allowing subpoenas for her financial and tax records, Poa said.
"As of now, there is none because when we advise her, we also have to give her the pros and cons. I'm preparing to do that, and only after I lay everything out before her can she decide if she agrees," Poa said during a press briefing.
Poa said he had already informed Duterte of Monday's ruling and requested a certified true copy of the order, but stressed that the defense has yet to thoroughly discuss whether to seek relief before the high court, adding that the team is also weighing the possible repercussions of such a move.
He added that while the defense maintained its opposition to the subpoenas, it had anticipated the possibility that the impeachment court would grant the prosecution's request and was prepared to proceed regardless of the outcome.
In a November 2024 online conference, Duterte claimed to be the victim of an assassination plot and said she had ordered that Marcos, First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos, and former House Speaker Martin Romualdez be killed if she were taken out first.
