Vice Pres. Sara Duterte Speaks on Confidential Funds of Pres. Bongbong Marcos’ Office
SARA DUTERTE – The Vice President claimed that she feels it’s disrespectful towards the OVP that the House is not investigating Marcos’ confidential funds.
Recently, the Commission on Audit or COA released the details about the Confidential Funds spent by the different offices under the Philippine government. The audit department also unveiled the intelligence fund spending of the different government offices in the country.
According to COA, the office of Pres. Bongbong Marcos is the top confidential funds spender in 2023. The Office of the President has spent a total of P2.25 billion confidential funds last year.
Furthermore, the office of Marcos is also the highest spender with regards to the intelligence funds. It has spent P2.31 billion intelligence funds in 2023 bringing the total CIFs spending of the OP to P4.56 billion.
The Department of Justice, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, and the Office of the Vice President come next in the list. According to the Commission on Audit, here are the confidential and intel funds spending of the different government offices in the country:
- Department of Justice (DOJ) — P683,853,000
- Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) — P500 million
- Office of the Vice-President Sara Duterte with P375 million
- National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA) with P127,413 million
- National Security Council (NSC) with P90 million
- Department of National Defense (DND) with P78,921 million
- Department of Interior and Local Government with P75 million
- Department of Finance with P61 million
- Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity with P49.5 million
- Department of Foreign Affairs with P35 million
Following the statement of the Commission on Audit regarding the confidential and intel funds spending of the different government agencies in the Philippines, Vice Pres. Sara Duterte encouraged the House members to also check on the CF of the office of Pres. Bongbong Marcos.
Based on a report on GMA News, Vice Pres. Sara Duterte said that if the House members conduct investigations in aid of legislation, they should not target just one office. She stressed that it must be done on a random sampling.
“If you are in aid of legislation and want to legislate about confidential funds, you do not target one office… What you do is you do a sampling, a random sampling of the offices who have confidential funds,” she said.
Vice Pres. Sara Duterte stressed that the office of Pres. Bongbong Marcos has billions of confidential funds. Based on the report, the Vice President finds it a disrespect towards the OVP that only her office is probed regarding the matter.
“That shows that they’re singling out the Office of the Vice President. And I really feel that it’s very disrespectful to the Office of the Vice President,” the Vice President said.
Aside from the Confidential Funds issue, Vice Pres. Sara Duterte is also faced with two impeachment complaints and the 3rd complaint is said to be filed next week.