House impeachment trial spokesperson Rep. Zia Alonto Adiong on Sunday questioned Vice President Sara Duterte's fitness to hold public office, alleging she violated basic government policies and mishandled hundreds of millions of pesos in confidential funds during her tenure as vice president and former mayor of Davao City.

“How can you be trusted with the mandate you have [been] given by the people, if you disregarded a simple policy on the use of confidential funds?”

The “simple” policy that the solon was referring to was Joint Circular No. 2015-01 which had laid the framework on how confidential funds were appropriated throughout various government offices, and how the same was to be liquidated for proper auditing.

“Can we trust the Vice President with the resources of the government, knowing that the policy, a very basic policy, she was not able to follow even the fact that she is a lawyer and she has been using confidential funds for over three years now,” Adiong said.

Through previous impeachment hearings, officials from the Commission on Audit (COA) testified that their agency had found numerous irregularities in how the Vice President utilized the P612.5 million confidential funds she was allocated between 2022 to 2023.

Among the discrepancies that were highlighted was the lack of supporting documents for the acknowledgement receipts which indicated the names believed to be the recipients of confidential funds.

Another matter that was uncovered in the trial was the fact that Duterte–even prior to her Vice Presidency–was allocated with confidential funds as a Mayor of Davao City.

Referencing the information, Adiong expressed that the Vice President should have already been aware with regards to how the confidential funds must be handled.

Even with his assumption, the lawmaker said that evidence clearly showed that Duterte decided to disregard the guidelines of the joint circular.

“Knowing that there is a joint circular because you were a mayor and you used confidential funds even before becoming a Vice President, you still violated the simple policy, you did not follow it, and you ordered someone to disregard and violate it,” he explained.

With the defiance from the guidelines, Adiong said that questions then shifted from whether or not Duterte committed a violation, it had shifted to if she was still fit to hold her role as a public official.

“What kind of leader does that…I mean, the fitness and the character of a leader, and the office she occupies is an impeachable offense, no?” he asked.

The lawmaker further maintained that the Constitution had clearly indicated that public officials were obligated to serve the public’s needs given that they were entrusted with managing how millions up to billions of funds were utilized.

Adiong argued that the evidence–at this point in the proceedings–showed that Duterte committed actions that constituted a betrayal of public trust, warranting for her to undergo the impeachment process.

“That alone proves that there was really a culpable violation of the Constitution, because it was stated in the Constitution that public office is a public trust,” he said.