SEN. Panfilo Lacson said he finds it puzzling that some fellow senators wanted to discredit the way he leads the investigation on the flood control fund scandal. The chairman of the Blue Ribbon Committee said Sens. Imee Marcos and Rodante Marcoleta seemed to be “intent on disrupting” the hearings. Marcoleta had questioned Lacson’s objectivity in pursuing the probe, while Marcos claimed that Lacson prohibited senators from dragging some Malacañang allies into the anomaly. “The problem is that there are those who want to disrupt the investigation. I don’t know what their end game is,” Lacson said on Sunday. He said Marcos “might want to apply as the Senate’s “meow-meow.” “We don’t want that, but it seems someone is intent on applying for the post,” the senator said. The Senate president pro tempore said the next Blue Ribbon hearing on the flood control project mess will be on Jan. 19. In a radio interview, he scored Marcos’ baseless criticisms that he banned members from linking personalities such as former speaker Martin Romualdez to the flood control fund scandal. Lacson said Marcos never attended hearings that he chaired. Marcos claimed that Lacson “limited” senators to 10 minutes in asking questions. But he said this was needed so that each senator can ask questions. “In the first place, what pressure is she talking about when she never attended any of the hearings I chaired? I have said before that the best response to nonsense is silence,” Lacson said. “But when she starts insulting [the panel], I cannot disregard it anymore. By insulting the Blue Ribbon Committee, she is undermining its integrity. Why does she not attend and ask questions?” he said. Lacson flagged P2.5 billion in “allocables” linked to Marcos in the 2025 National Expenditure Program (NEP). He also questioned her silence on the supposed “giniling” or “pork” allocation in the 2026 budget bill when it was being tackled at the bicameral conference level. “Marcos had allocables worth P2.5 billion in the NEP according to the Cabral files,” Lacson said. These are based on documents he received from the camp of the late Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) undersecretary Catalina Cabral. Lacson said that while Marcos rejected the ratified version of the 2026 budget bill due to increases in funding for assistance programs she labeled as “soft pork” — among them the Medical Assistance to Indigent and Financially Incapacitated Patients and Assistance to Individuals in Crisis Situations — she had pork at least in the 2025 General Appropriations Act and was “even physically present in the distribution of ayudas (assistance) last year.” “She was so fond of attending such distributions, and now she says there is ‘pork giniling’ in the budget? You know, if you don’t have any moral ascendancy, just keep quiet because it will come back to you. People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones,” Lacson said.