Inday Sara Duterte shielded attacks on the office of the OVP.

There was no misappropriation of the Office of the Vice President’s (OVP) confidential funds in 2022, Vice President Sara Duterte has maintained. The Vice President stated as much after House Deputy Minority Leader France Castro declared on Friday that Duterte might be impeached for his purported noncompliance with the regulations pertaining to the 73 million in confidential funds for 2022.

According to Duterte, a text message to GMA Integrated News, “There was no misuse of any funds. There is, however, an unending political attack by the Makabayan-Romualdez-Marcos alliance to mask the real problem of the country right now.”

She continued, “This is the sad plight of the poor and the hungry because of the unabated rise of food prices. Ordinary citizens’ principles are not for sale, ayuda will not solve the growing dissent. It is a classic ‘wag the dog’ piece.”
Plus, Duterte said to her detractors, “Dapat magtrabaho muna bago pulitika [you should work first before politicking.”

Of the P125 million in confidential funds that the Office of the Vice President, under Duterte, disbursed in 11 days, the Commission on Audit (COA) had issued a Notice of Disallowance on P73 millions of those funds.

During the discussion of the OVP’s P2 billion budget plan for 2025, COA Assistant Commissioner Alexander Juliano clarified that the Notice of Disallowance indicated that the expenditure was either irregular, unneeded, exorbitant, extravagant, or unconscionable.

Castro claimed that Duterte had broken the law and that the COA’s conclusions demonstrated “a clear betrayal of public trust.”
The COA’s findings show a flagrant misappropriation of public funds. The solon stated that it is becoming clear that Duterte was using the purported cloak of secrecy surrounding Confidential Funds to cover up her improper usage of people’s money.

She can’t mishandle the money and get away with it. Accountability is something that’s necessary. Impeachment is a definite possibility if these funds are misused in conjunction with a dearth of financing for social services and a reluctance to account for expenditures.
Duterte stated earlier in a House session that there was documentation of the alleged orchestration of impeachment attempts against her by members of the house.