by Daniel Long

 

Shimenet like the facts presented in this article, shimenet like the other side of the coin, but there are two sides to every story. The other side exists and should be considered by anyone claiming to be objective and unbiased.

Unless they live under a rock, most people are likely aware about the controversy regarding Vice President Sara Duterte and her use of “confidential funds”. The mainstream narrative is that Sara squandered (nagwaldas) P125 million in confidential funds in 11 or 19 days. Many people believe that this government practice of secret funds is an anomaly, the short amount of time the funds were utilized is either suspicious or illegal, Sara basically pocketed the money, and therefore she should be impeached. According to the Vice President, she said the “confidential funds” are intended for the safe, secure, and successful implementations of her offices’ programs, projects and activities. She also said that for DepEd, the “confidential funds” will be used to fight sexual grooming of students, recruitment to terrorism, school shooters, recruitment of children in criminal activities, and drug use among personnel and students. It is my view that the ordinary person’s ignorance of the law is being taken advantage of by Sara’s political rivals to try to destroy her character through propaganda. Let us try to get the full context of the issue.

First of all, the use of “confidential funds” is allowed under the law. In January 2015, the Commission on Audit, the official guardian of all government funds and offices, issued guidelines on the use of confidential and intelligence funds. The rules say that the use of these funds are subject to an audit by the COA but clarified that there is no requirement to submit receipts. It says nothing about regulating the timing of the use of these funds. It does not say that they cannot be utilized for only a few days. Ombudsman Justice Samuel Martires, whose job is to investigate and prosecute corrupt government officials, has explained that requiring publicly available and detailed receipts of confidential funds defeats the purpose of calling the funds “confidential” in the first place. He also said recently that Sara is not guilty of corruption.

Second, it is not only the Office of the Vice President that had confidential funds. According to the proposed 2025 National Budget, the Marcos government is requesting P10 billion in confidential and intelligence funds. BBM or the Office of the President is requesting P4.5 billion, the Department of National Defense (DND) P1.8 billion, the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) P906 million, Department of Justice (DOJ) P579.4 million, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) P500 million, Department of Transportation (DOTr) P405 million, and Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) P18 million.

Why is it then that only the Office of the Vice President is singled out, investigated, and attacked for having confidential funds? If anything, Sara should be the government official least suspected of corruption. Why do I dare say this? It is because she has a proven track record of fiscal responsibility as Mayor of Davao City. During her time there, she launched the Peace 911 Initiative to liberate the 13 barangays of Davao City from the NPA terrorists. Billions in confidential funds were utilized to implement the program. In less than two years, the city declared itself NPA-free. It was a success. Who are we in Metro Manila to question the results? We never had to suffer a traumatizing NPA presence here which Paquibato District suffered. Sara kept her constituents safe and fostered peace and order which made Davao City the 8th richest city in the country. Finally, she left the city as Mayor debt-free in 2022 after receiving the highest number of votes (32 million) in Philippine history for an election as Vice President.

Do Sara’s bashers know that former President Noynoy Aquino and DOJ Secretary Leila De Lima also had issues of “unexplained” confidential fund use?

Since Sara found the hearings in the Congress and Senate last year questioning her secret expenses in 2022 divisive, she decided not to pursue them anymore for 2024 and 2025 saying that the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education personnel can do their jobs without them. Despite this, various lawmakers are still hounding her on the confidential fund issue. They say that Sara is unprofessional and evasive, and her antagonistic statements during hearings are not germane to their inquiries. But is it germane for Representative France Castro, who was found by a court of law guilty of child abuse, to ask about Sara’s 2022 confidential fund use in a hearing about the 2025 budget? It is worth noting that even Mabakayan bloc representatives Castro and Arlene Brosas, who have been the noisiest in demanding transparency from Sara, have themselves admitted at one point that they had no evidence that she misused or stole her confidential funds.

Furthermore, it is the COA which is the proper forum for checking Sara’s use of confidential funds and NOT the Congress or the Senate. While it is true that lawmakers have the “power of the purse” and it is their job to make sure funds are properly allocated and used by government agencies, they should not act as if they are auditors. I find it rich that congressmen, who merely liquidate their MOEs (Maintenance and Operating Expenses) through mere certification or signature, virtue signal as if they are clean. We used to do “check your own paper” in my high school days, that is basically how congressmen liquidate their millions in MOEs every year. No receipts.

Atty. Gloria Camora, from COA’s Intelligence and Confidential Funds Audit Office, has testified under oath in multiple congressional hearings that Sara’s use of confidential funds is in line with their rules and that her office voluntarily submitted liquidation reports on time. Sara’s DepEd has also received an “unqualified opinion” rating from the COA for 2022 and 2023. In other words, the best type of audit report a government agency can receive. This, in my opinion, should put the whole controversy to rest. As to the “P73M notice of disallowance” issue, this is not proof of theft of the secret funds but merely issued to request for documents from the Vice President explaining how her secret funds were utilized. Sara is also facing cases at the Supreme Court for the confidential funds issue. I’m sure that even at 94 – veteran lawyer Estelito Mendoza, who is representing her, is more than capable of winning her three home runs.

Those bandwagoning (nakikiuso) on this issue are not even aware that it was BBM who authorized the transfer of confidential funds to Sara in the first place. In August 2022, Sara wrote a letter to the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) requesting P221 million in confidential funds for the safe establishment of new satellite offices of the Office of the Vice President and the safe implementation of her various programs. (Libreng Sakay buses, medical/burial assistance, disaster relief operations, etc.) On December 13, 2022, the Office of the President authorized the transfer of the funds. The Office of the Vice President started to utilize the funds on December 20, 2022. The move was defended by Executive Secretary Chief Justice Lucas Bersamin, the “Little President”, saying that “Vice President Sara, who was newly elected then, needed funds for her new programs for the remaining period of 2022. The President supported this initiative and released the funds.” The question is, if Sara’s detractors are morally convinced that there was funny business with the confidential funds, why is Sara the only one being scrutinized? Why no hate for BBM who not only approved of but also transferred the secret funds late in the first place? Government funds have to be utilized before the year ends. In this case, Sara only had 11 days (from December 20, 2022) to utilize the confidential funds before the end of 2022. According to COA Atty. Camora, the P125M confidential fund was spent on 132 locations and the Office of the Vice President submitted documentary evidence. I guarantee that 99% of those who amused themselves to death with the social media memes bashing the Vice President for spending her secret funds in 11 or 19 days are not even aware of these crucial facts. I do not blame them though, as this part of the story is underreported by mainstream media.

Senator Risa Hontiveros said last year that she does not believe the DepEd needs confidential funds because in her view, the agency does not directly relate to national security like the Armed Forces of the Philippines, the Philippine Navy, or the Philippine Coast Guard. Former Vice President Leni Robredo did not have confidential funds, but that was because her fight was against poverty and helping the poor (laylayan), while Sara’s focus is security and expanding her successful campaign against the NPA in Davao nationwide. Comparing the two women is comparing apples and oranges. So why exactly should Sara have confidential funds in the first place? According to her, it is to fight sexual grooming of students, recruitment to terrorism, school shooters, recruitment of children in criminal activities, and drug use among personnel and students. But wouldn’t a successful campaign against these threats to a safe learning environment for students depend on good intelligence and surveillance? Wouldn’t it involve rental of safehouses, purchase of information, and spies? Finally, wouldn’t it compromise efforts to combat these threats if the details on how the confidential funds were utilized are made public? In 2023, the DepEd claimed that 16 public schools in Metro Manila were engaging in NPA recruitment. The NPA has been designated as a terrorist group by the Philippine government, the US, the European Union, and Japan. The group has killed up to 50,000 Filipino civilians, soldiers, and police. Many from my generation have been recruited in public schools and universities to join the NPA and end up being killed fighting soldiers in the countryside. We shouldn’t be surprised then that known allied lawmakers and activist groups of the NPA are rallying for Sara’s impeachment and calling for abolishing confidential funds. It turns out, armed with the secret funds, the Vice President would have finally eliminated the world’s longest and largest ongoing communist insurgency.

As for the “Mary Grace Piattos” issue, it really is a nothingburger. In a congressional hearing, when Congressman Romeo Acop asked COA lawyer Atty. Camora, if the name of the confidential informant who signed an Office of the Vice President acknowledgment receipt is “Mary Grace Piattos”, she explained to the stubborn lawmaker multiple times that the name is “Piatty”, not “Piattos”. Why are they now compromising intelligence activities all for a one-liner political attack on Sara? It makes no sense. Furthermore, it is ridiculous for Congress to request the birth certificate of “Mary Grace Piattos” from the Philippine Statistics Authority. “Piatty” is an alias or codename of a real person who is a confidential informant. Again, why single out the Office of the Vice President? Why not uncover all the identities of all of the confidential informants for the 350 government agencies that are recipients of secret funds? Regardless, “Piattos” has become a popular meme in social media – a forced meme, I might add. The problem with insisting that a joke is reality is that the joke eventually stops being funny. The reality though is that the sitting President, Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr., has been accused of cocaine use and continues to ignore calls from the public for an independent hair follicle drug test. “Piattos” may not exist, but manifestations of drug use (ngiwi jaw, Araw ng Kagitingan dripping nose, and puffy face) do.

Finally, Sara also faced controversy for a book she authored entitled “Isang Kaibigan”. Her detractors are trying to define her legacy at DepEd with the book. They even spread misinformation that the production of the book cost P10 million in government funds and that it was plagiarized. The truth is that the book was not for sale, DepEd did not pay for the book’s printing, and it only costs P50 to print a copy. The P10 million amount comes from the fact that 200,000 copies (P50 x 200,000 = P10 million) were distributed to school children to complement DepEd’s campaign to address the low reading comprehension of Filipino students.

I will end with a testimony of a Kakampink public school teacher who was thankful to Sara for her achievements as Education Secretary. No wonder DepEd received the highest approval ratings out of all government agencies when she was at the helm.

   

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