OVP budget hearing to resume on Sept. 10

Vice President Sara Duterte will face on 10 September members of the House of Representatives, with whom she had a rhetorical duel, with the same questions over her contentious P125 million confidential funds. 

In an interview on Thursday, Batangas Rep. Gerville Luistro is convinced that her colleagues would shed clarity anew on how the Office of the Vice President (OVP) spent the P125 million confidential funds in 2022—the same question that irked the VP during the previous budget hearing on Tuesday. 

"Just like me, who did not hear a proper explanation [from Duterte], I anticipate that my fellow congressmen will be raising the same questions about the confidential fund," she said in a mix of English and Filipino.

The House Committee on Appropriations deferred the deliberations on the OVP's proposed P2.037 billion for next year after members of the panel Duterte embroiled in a verbal sparring.

Duterte blew a fuse when lawmakers raised questions on how she utilized in 2022 her P125 million confidential funds, which she argued is no longer covered by the topic of the 2025 budget. 

Former president and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, a close ally of the VP, was one of the three lawmakers who came to Duterte's defense despite being obviously outnumbered. 

"What is being questioned now is the 2023 budget, which was discussed extensively last year, and that is the reason why the House removed the confidential funds. So that issue has already been——to my mind, for the purpose of the budget hearing——laid to rest," Arroyo said. 

Luistro lamented that members of Congress have all the right to scrutinize Duterte's budget utilization since part of their function is to ensure the budget enactments are strictly implemented or at least reasonably implemented.

"Although 2022 has ended, we have what is called an oversight function, which is simply described as post-enactment monitoring. So, I humbly believe that we are in a proper position to ask about this confidential fund," Luistro said in the interview.  

She added, "We just want to have a proper explanation [if] it was used for the purpose of national security of peace and order as mandated by joint circular no. 2015-01 in relation to confidential funds.

Disallowed

Of the P125 million confidential funds of the OVP in 2022, P73.28 million was disallowed by the Commission on Audit (CoA).

Based on the CoA's notice of disallowance, P69.8 million of the P73 million was used for reward payment (P10 million), payment of reward of various goods (P34.857 million), and payment of reward of medicines (P24.93 million).

Meanwhile, the P3.5 million was used to pay for chairs, desktop computers, and printers. 

The CoA said the use of P69.8 million funds was disallowed due to OVP's non-submission of documents evidencing the success of information gathering and/or surveillance activities to support the acknowledgment receipts for payments of rewards in cash, various goods, and medicines.

Likewise, the CoA stated that the OVP failed to specify that the P3.5 million was intended for confidential operations or activities.

The OVP's P125 million confidential funds were part of the P221.42 million contingent fund of the Office of the President transferred to Duterte's office in 2022, which opposition lawmakers earlier claimed was unconstitutional since there was no line item for such in the 2022 General Appropriations Act.

Duterte—who said in 2023 that whoever is against confidential funds is against peace—repeatedly told members of the appropriations panel that she would forego the opportunity to defend her office's budget and leave it up to the House.

The OVP's budget sponsor, Lanao del Sur Rep. Zia Alonto Adiong, said it was "upsetting" to witness such budget deliberation when they were just expecting the VP to explain the rationale behind her proposed budget and her intended programs. 

"The way that we saw how the Vice President was, to me, is really irregular because that's not the usual response that we normally get from heads of agencies and offices," Adiong said in a separate interview on Thursday. 

Adiong earlier admitted that defending the OVP's budget in the plenary would be "a lot difficult task for" him if Duterte will provide the same generic answer in the next scheduled hearing on 10 September.