VP Sara: P650-M confidential funds for OVP, DepEd needed to address DepEd problems

Vice President Sara Duterte, who also sits as Education Secretary, justified the P650 million total confidential funds for both the Office of the Vice President and Department of Education, saying such a significant amount is essential to address problems of the education sector.

Duterte made the response when asked by House Assistant Minority Leader Arlene Brosas of Gabriela party-list why is there a need to allocate P500 million confidential fund for the OVP and another P150 million confidential fund for the Education Department when there are many unfunded programs in DepEd such as the construction of around 167,000 classrooms and repairs of at least 149,000 classrooms.

"The OVP and the DepEd are two separate entities with separate mandates. The success of the programs, activities and projects [of an agency] depends on very good intelligence [reports] and surveillance because you want to target specific issues and challenges," Duterte said during DepEd's presentation of its proposed P710-billion budget for 2023.

Duterte said DepEd is dealing with a lot of problems involving learners such as sexual grooming and/or sexual abuse involving school officials/personnel, recruitment of children in criminal activities, drug use among youth, among others.

"We need the help of the security sector to address these challenges to basic education," Duterte said.

"Basic education is directly linked to the national security of our country," Duterte added.

The 2022 national budget does not have confidential funds allocated for the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education. 

During the same budget deliberations, House Appropriations panel chairperson Elizaldy Co of Ako-Bicol party-list expressed support both for OVP's proposed budget of P2.3 billion and DepEd's proposed budget of P710 billion for next year.

“Bulk of the budget will go toward good governance projects and the social services. I speak for my colleagues when I say that this committee has full confidence in the Vice President's performance of her duties,” Co said.

“Days from assuming office, the OVP has been very active. Within that short period, various satellite offices have been established all over the country which enabled the government to expand the reach of its social services," Co added.

In addition, Co congratulated Duterte and the rest of DepEd team for the successful resumption of face-to-face classes after two years of online classes.

Co, however, conceded that there is more to be done such as allocating funding for the Basic Education Development Plan 2030, the alternative learning system, the Last Mile School, the Basic Education-Learning Continuity Plan, and other projects.

“We must do more. We must help our students catch up. We must help our communities build better and more school facilities that are disaster-resilient, especially after the recent earthquake in Luzon," Co said.

"And we must [also] show gratitude to our teachers by giving them adequate compensation at the very least,” Co added. — RSJ, GMA News