Recent Commission on Audit (CoA) findings on anomalies at the state-run Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) when Sen. Joel Villanueva was its head prompt a nagging question about accountability on the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).

The DAP was the biggest scam ever done on public funds and the TESDA racket on “ghost” scholars and bogus training programs was only part of the funds diversions that went on during the term of Noynoy that benefited his cronies.

Recently appointed Ombudsman Samuel Martires should review the friendly and preemptive usurpation of legislative powers that Noynoy appointee Conchita Carpio-Morales, Martires’ predecessor, filed against the former President and his rasputin former Budget Secretary Florencio Abad.

Abad was named by alleged P10-billion pork barrel anomaly mastermind Janet Lim Napoles as her mentor in the pilferage of the Priority Development Assistance Fund or the legislative pork barrel.

Morales indicted Noynoy and Abad with “usurpation of legislative powers” on the implementation of the DAP, which amounted to a slap on the wrist since, if proven guilty, both stand to face a fine of P1,000 and a few months of jailtime.

Some P150 billion in the budget was reportedly converted to Noynoy’s slush fund for his agenda of vindictive politics andself-preservation.

Problems that affect the public are intricately linked to the DAP such as the inefficient Metro Rail Transit (MRT)-3 in which P4.5 billion of its maintenance funds was diverted to the DAP.

Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra should also update the public on the investigations his office had made on the DAP, particularly its use in the ouster of former Supreme Court (SC) Chief Justice Renato Corona.

Noynoy rushed Corona’s impeachment conviction supposedly in retaliation to the SC ruling in favor of the distribution to farmers of the Cojuangco-Aquino clan-owned Hacienda Luisita under the agrarian reform law.

Corona in a speech in front of the SC when the House of Representatives started the impeachment process on him stated that the first reason he was on trial was the Hacienda Luisita decision.

In November last year, former Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre ordered the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to probe Aquino and Abad based on information provided by former Manila Councilor Greco Belgica.

Belgica mostly used documents showing the extensive use of the DAP for Corona’s removal.

The documents alleged 82 members of the House of Representatives received funds from the DAP on 23 November 2011 amounting to P819 million.

The date was a day after the SC ruling on Hacienda Luisita was promulgated.

Senators also received DAP funds on 14 December 2011 or on the day the articles of impeachment were filed before the Senate.

The DAP was declared illegal by the SC since it circumvented the authority of Congress to allocate funds by taking pieces of the budget and repackaging these as savings and realignments for conversion into lump sum money on which Noynoy had full discretion.

The DAP was created in 2011, but it was made only after former Sen. Jinggoy Estrada revealed in a privilege speech on 25 September 2013 that P50 million in incentives was given to senator judges who voted to convict Corona in the impeachment court.

During a Senate hearing on the fund, it was established that the DAP releases needed the knowledge and approval of Noynoy that would necessarily include the P50 million in “incentives” granted to each of the senator judges who convicted Corona in the 2012 impeachment trial.

In the first DAP memo issued by Abad dated 12 October 2011, Noynoy signed and approved the release of P72.110 billion.

One of the documents — dated 21 December 2011, or 10 days after the House of Representatives voted to adopt the articles of impeachment against then Chief Justice Renato Corona — showed Noynoy approving additional projects worth P13.379 billion for House members.

Again on 27 June 2012, or about a month after the Senate voted to impeach Corona, Aquino signed and approved another Abad memorandum seeking the “omnibus authority to consolidate savings/unutilized balances and their realignment.”

The approved projects amounted to P32 billion, including P2 billion for Tarlac roadworks and another P8.3 billion in “various local projects.”

Noynoy also allowed withdrawal of unobligated balances of national government agencies for “slow moving projects,” declaring them as savings and authorizing the funds for these projects realigned.

On 5 September 2012, or one month before the five-day filing of certificates of candidacy for the May 2013 mid-term polls, Aquino signed and approved Abad’s 4 September 2012, memorandum seeking the “release of funds for other priority projects and expenditures of government” worth P5.973 billion.

On 21 December 2012, the President approved the release of P33.293 billion in DAP funds, chargeable against “available savings and the 2012 Unprogrammed Fund” which was prior to the 100-day campaign period for the May 2013 polls that started on 13 January 2013.

The fingerprints of Noynoy and Abad were all over the graft-ridden DAP funds distributed to their allies and all of them, without exception, should account for the pillage of people’s money.