Threats and coercion levied by ex-president Rodrigo Duterte against the House of Representatives in an attempt to reinstate his daughter Vice President Sara Duterte's P650 million in confidential funds that the chamber had stripped will not yield the intended result, Deputy Majority Leader Franz Pumaren said Monday.

Pumaren defended the House leadership's decision after Duterte accused House Speaker Martin Romualdez of alleged corruption and sabotaging the VP's request for confidential funds in the proposed 2024 budget.

The former chief executive also said ACT Teachers Rep. Franz Pumaren would have been the "first target" of his daughter's intelligence fund.

"As the good former president should know, we, as lawmakers… do not respond well to threats and intimidation. If his allegations have bases, then he should go to the proper channels and file charges," Pumaren said.

"But to insinuate bodily harm or even the murder of a member of the House of Representatives, this has gone too far," the lawmaker added, urging Duterte to be cautious and reasonable in his criticisms.

Pumaren told Duterte that the House's decision should not be interpreted as a personal affront "as several other agencies also faced the same redistribution."

"If the former president thinks this is wrong, our doors are always open in the House of Representatives for dialogues," he said.

In the same vein, Isabela Rep. Tonypet Albano asserted that the House "does not have any confidential funds," highlighting a 2022 CoA report that found that the chamber did not incur any "disallowances."

The House has been exchanging barbs with the ex-president on Duterte's corruption allegations against Romualdez. Several party leaders in the House, including members of the PDP-Laban party formerly chaired by Duterte, condemned his accusations, saying he chose to "malign the very institution that for years supported many of his own legislative priorities."

Duterte made insinuations that the House has hidden "pork barrel," a controversial practice already declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in November 2013.

He also said the Commission on Audit should look into the House's use of funds.

Duterte, a former Davao congressman from 1998 to 2001, also referred to Congress as "the most rotten institution" in the country.

Duterte made the accusations last week following the House's decision to include his daughter's offices — the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education — in five agencies awarded zero confidential funds for next year.

The VP, who sought P500 million and P150 million in confidential funds for OVP and DepEd, respectively, previously accused critics of her secret funds of having "insidious motivations."

The Makabayan bloc's Castro, along with some members of the minority, waged a successful battle against the VP's secret funds.