VICE President Sara Duterte originally requested the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) last year to release P250 million in confidential funds to her office, but only half of the amount was released in December 2022.
A copy of the letter request, which was addressed to DBM Secretary Amenah Pangandaman, was released by Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman who reiterated that the transfer of P125 million in confidential funds from the Office of the President (OP) to the Office of the Vice President (OVP) was illegal.
“For and in consideration of the safe implementation of the various projects and activities under the good governance program and the conduct of official engagements, and functional representation in international and domestic events as instructed by the President, the CF amount of P250 million is hereby requested,” Duterte told Pangandaman in the letter dated August 22, 2022.
She also said in the letter: “The Office of the Vice President is committed to formulate programs, projects, and activities (PPAs) relevant to national security and peace and order and is devoted to implement said PPAs with proper security and safety protocols for the benefit of the institution through the OVP satellite offices, its partner stakeholders and the general public.”
Of the requested amount, only P125 million, which was covered by a DBM special allotment release order (SARO) to the OVP, was released from the Executive’s contingent funds, which critics said was anomalous since the Executive was not authorized to do so.
Lagman was able to secure a copy of the Vice President’s letter after he requested for it during the plenary deliberations on the OP’s proposed P10.7 billion budget for 2024.
Rep. Erwin Tulfo (PL, ACT-CIS), the sponsor of the OP’s budget, committed to have the DBM officially submit a copy of Duterte’s letter to the Office of the Majority Leader Manuel Jose Dalipe.
In the same letter, the OVP asked for P144.72 million as augmentation of financial assistance being extended by its satellite offices in Bacolod, Cebu, Dagupan, Davao, Surigao, Tacloban and Zamboanga which Duterte said catered to 100 to 150 clients daily per office.
She also asked for P8.74 million as augmentation for the special duty allowance of the Vice Presidential Security and Protection Group (VPSG), which has 450 members.
Lastly, Duterte also requested for P107.46 million to pay for 192 coterminous and contractual employees.
Lagman said that Under Section 25 (5) of Article VI of the Constitution, “transfer of funds is prohibited except with respect to constitutional officers like the President relative to savings for augmentation of any deficient allocation in their respective offices.”
Consequently, he said any transfer of funds from the OP to another office like the OVP is unconstitutional.
The veteran lawyer-lawmaker, a former chair of the House Committee on Appropriations, said the transfer for augmentation must be from savings of the office concerned.
“It was admitted that in the President’s contingent fund, the savings in 2022 was only P50 million but the release to the Office of the Vice President was P125 million. In other words, it was not from savings. Moreover, the Office of the President, through its sponsor, repeatedly said that the release of the amount was not from savings,” he said.
Besides, Lagman said there was nothing to be augmented because the OVP “had a zero appropriation for confidential funds in 2022.”
“Zero appropriation cannot be augmented. The fund transfer or release also derogates the clear intention of the Congress not to appropriate any allocation for said item. The letter dated 22 August 2022 of the Vice President to the Budget Secretary requested for the release of funds by augmentation and for confidential funds, both of which are prohibited,” he stressed.
PBBM APPROVAL
Tulfo, a neophyte lawmaker, insisted that the transferred confidential fund came from the contingent fund and is not from savings.
“The contingent fund is a special purpose fund (SPF) for new or urgent projects or activities. So, the request of the OVP came up after the GAA was approved, therefore the OP has to release funds because it was requested by the OVP,” Tulfo said.
The SPF are appropriations in the national budget that have no specific purpose yet but will cover expenditures that have not yet been identified during budget preparation.
Tulfo said President Marcos Jr. personally read the OVP’s request and approved the release of P125 million “and this is covered by rules and regulations covered by the release of the Office of the President this budget.”
“I believe the letter was given to the President, the President saw the letter and it was passed onto the DBM,” Tulfo said. “The participation of the Office of the President is only the approval of the release of the P125 million to the Office of the Vice President.”
Tulfo said the request was approved because it was “covered by good governance and social services.”
Castro, a member of the Makabayan bloc, said the transfer was clearly an augmentation of an existing budget item of the OVP and “this is a prohibited transfer of fund from one budget item to another” since only savings can be used for such purpose, and not the OP’s contingent fund.
She cited Article 6, Section 25.5 of the Constitution which states that “no law shall be passed authorizing any transfer of appropriations; however, the President, the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and the heads of Constitutional Commissions may, by law, be authorized to augment any item in the general appropriations law for their respective offices from savings in other items of their respective appropriations.”
Tulfo maintained that the transfer was “not an augmentation but a part of the contingent fund that was given to the social services of the OVP.”
MAGIC?
Senate deputy minority leader Risa Hontiveros asked the OVP what kind of “magic” it did in spending P125 million confidential funds in just 11 days.
“Hindi na lang ‘yan spending spree. ‘Yan ay paglapastangan sa mamamayan (That is not only spending spree, but also a disgrace to the Filipino people),” Hontiveros said in a statement.
She made the remark after Marikina Rep. Stella Quimbo disclosed information from an ongoing audit of the P125 million confidential fund which showed that the amount was disbursed in 11 days, not 19 days as earlier revealed by militant lawmakers at the House. This translates to a spending of around P11 million per day.
Hontiveros said the OVP spent not its own money but of the people’s.
“Confidential funds can be validly spent only on expenditures supporting surveillance activities of civilian agencies. Yung ating Coast Guard sa West Philippine Sea, araw-araw binabantayan ang sumpong ng China, 17 years pinagkasya ang P117 million na confidential funds. Ang OVP hindi man lang umabot sa dalawang linggo (Our Coast Guard, which monitors China’s aggressions in the West Philippine Sea, managed to do with its P117 million confidential funds for 17 years. The OVP, on the other hand, did not even take two weeks to spend theirs),” she added.
She said Duterte should explain how her office spent the money in 11 days.
“What can VP Sara show for it? Nag-mass hiring ba ang OVP ng libo-libong informant sa loob ng 11 na raw? Nagpatayo ba sla ng daan-daang safehouse sa loob lamang ng 11 na araw? (Did the OVP hire thousands of informants in 11 days? Did it construct hundreds of safehouses in 11 days?),” she added.
Hontiveros said she will go back to her earlier question on where the OVP really spent the money. “Saan niyo dinala ang pera? Naghihinaty ng resibo ang buong Pilipinas (Where did you bring the money? The country is waiting for you to present proof),” she said.
OP’s BIGGER CIF
Castro also raised concerns over the proposed P4.56 billion confidential and intelligence funds (CIF) of the OP, saying “it highlights the excessive spending by the administration, which amounts to more than P12 million a day in hard cash for 365 days on average.”
“This is on a whole new level and even dwarfs the P11 million per day spree of the vice president in the last days of December 2022,” said the former teacher.
Castro said the huge amount allocated to the CIF raises questions about its purpose and how it is being utilized, especially since “there is a growing clamor to abolish the CIF and make the national budget more transparent.”
“We must prioritize the needs of the people, especially during these challenging times. It is crucial that we allocate funds to address urgent issues like poverty, unemployment, and high inflation,” she said.
Last Monday night, Manuel also questioned the proposed P50 million CF of the Department of Agriculture which is headed by the President as concurrent agriculture secretary.
Isabela Rep. Antonio Albano, the DA’s budget sponsor, said the amount will be used to reward informants who will provide tips on smugglers as well as operational expenses, including “vehicle rentals, internet expenses, intelligence summits, and coordination meetings.”
“One of the major national security goals is food security. Food insecurity, this destabilizes the economy and displaces the marginalized community, resulting into overall social instability. All of the direct threats to food security is agri-fisheries smuggling because it affects the overall well-being of farmers, fisherfolk and agricultural stakeholders. It contributes to the losses of government revenues,” Albano said.
“As the lead agency in ensuring a food secure and resilient Philippines, the Department of Agriculture is therefore, mandated to address this threat through curbing agri-fisheries smuggling, and price manipulation, leading to economic sabotage, which involves apprehension and prosecution of illegal smugglers. That is the reason for the budget of P50 million,” he added.
DEFERRED
The OVP’s budget was supposed to be tackled on the floor on Tuesday after the OP’s budget, but Duterte requested for it to be moved today (Wednesday) supposedly because of a conflict in her schedule.
“The deliberation of the proposed budget of the OVP as well as the DepEd (Department of Education) has been temporarily moved tomorrow considering that we also have other agencies in the pipeline,” deputy majority leader Janette Garin told the floor on the questioning of Rep. France Castro (PL, ACT).
The Vice President is the concurrent secretary of the DepEd.
Rep. Raoul Manuel (PL, Kabataan) slammed the deferral of the deliberations on the OVP’s budget, saying it has been scheduled two weeks ago only for Duterte to cancel it.
“Last minute cancellations with vague explanations in any context is unprofessional. Kung walang malinaw na paliwanag, ang dating lang ay parang natakot ang OVP at DepEd na humarap sa mamamayan at magpaliwanag lalo tungkol sa kanilang confidential funds (If there is no clear explanation, the OVP and DepEd appears to have chickened out from facing the people and explain, especially about their confidential funds),” he told the floor. — With Raymond Africa
