Vice Pres. Sara Duterte Visits OVP Chief-of-Staff Detained at House
SARA DUTERTE – The Vice President spent the night at the House of Representatives after visiting her detained chief-of-staff, Attorney Zuleika Lopez.
The investigation over the use the of the budget of the Office of the Vice President (OVP) and the Department of Education (DepEd) during the term of Vice Pres. Duterte continues. However, Duterte once again skipped the hearing set by the House regarding her office’s budget use.
According to Vice Pres. Sara Duterte, she already appeared at the first hearing of the House of Representatives regarding her office’s budget use and she will not do it again. The Vice President stressed that she only sat there and she was allegedly not even asked during the inquiry.
Duterte refused to take an oath at the first hearing over her office’s budget use. She also skipped several House hearings for the deliberation of the 2025 budget proposal of the Office of the Vice President.
The OVP asked for a P2 billion budget from the national government for 2025. After she skipped several hearings, the lower chamber approved a P733 million budget for the office of the Vice President.
Recently, the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability conducted a hearing on the use of the budget of the OVP and DepEd. However, only the officials of the OVP appeared at the hearing following the statement of Vice Pres. Duterte that she will not attend the hearing.
At the end of the inquiry, the chief-of-staff of the OVP, Atty. Zuleika Lopez, was cited for contempt for “undue interference in the conduct of proceedings”. The House panel members ordered Lopez to be detained within the House until Monday, November 25, 2024.
Based on a report on Manila Bulletin, Vice Pres. Sara Duterte visited Atty. Zuleika Lopez on Thursday night. House Secretary General Reginald Velasco confirmed the visit of the Vice President to her chief-of-staff.
According to Velasco, Duterte arrived at around 07:40 p.m. and visited Lopez at the visitor’s center. The Vice President and her chief-of-staff talked until 10:00 p.m. Based on the report, after it, the Vice President proceeded to the office of her elder brother, Davao City First District Representative Paolo Duterte, and spent the night there.
“From then on, she stayed there…until now nandun siya (she’s there),” Velasco said.
At the latest House hearing over the OVP and the DepEd Confidential Funds use, several officials of the office of Duterte including her chief-of-staff denied having a role in the disbursement of the Confidential Funds. House Speaker Martin Romualdez raised the possibility that only Duterte knows how the budget was used.