THE Davao City government reported P2.697 billion in confidential expenses between 2016 to 2022, or an average of P385.3 million annually in the last seven years, documents submitted to the Commission on Audit (COA) showed.
This was revealed in the breakdown of Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) in the city government’s Financial Statements attached to its annual audit reports.
Based on the MOOE figures, the city incurred P144 million as confidential expenses in 2016, the first half of which was under former mayor Rodrigo Duterte before he assumed the presidency in June 30 of that year.
Duterte was succeeded by his daughter, Sara Duterte-Carpio, who held the post until June 30, 2022 when she was elected vice president.
In 2017, Davao City’s confidential expenses more than doubled to P293 million or an increase of 103.5 percent compared to the year before.
Under the 2018 MOOE, the same expense item increased to P420 million or a 43.34 percent uptick from the previous year.
For 2019, it increased again to P460 million and remained pegged to that amount for 2020, 2021 and 2022.
A comparison with the MOOE of other major cities showed Davao City’s confidential fund spending is much bigger than Makati City, Manila, Quezon City, or Cebu City all of which are a lot wealthier and putting up bigger incomes.
In its 2022 MOOE, Cebu City disclosed P7.38 million as “payment for confidential, intelligence, and extraordinary expenses,” up P1.96 million from P5.42 million in 2021.
The City of Manila posted P120 million confidential fund expenditures for 2021 and 2022.
Makati, the second wealthiest among the country’s cities, reported P240 million confidential expenses from both 2021 and 2022.
Quezon City, the wealthiest city three years running, reported P100 million confidential expenses in 2021 and P75 million in 2022.
