COA tells House panel it questioned OVP's confidential fund spending in 2023

The Commission on Audit has questioned how the Office of the Vice President spent portions of its confidential fund over three quarters in 2023, a state auditor told a House inquiry on Wednesday.

Atty. Gloria Camora, the team leader of the COA unit that audited the OVP's confidential funds in 2023, confirmed that the COA issued three audit observation memorandums (AOM) for the OVP's confidential fund spending as it seemed to be non-compliant with the 2015 joint circular on the use of the allocations.

Appearing before the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability's investigation into the confidential funds of Vice President Sara Duterte's office, Camora said the audit team required more supporting documents for the spending.

"The payment of rewards, the joint circular requires supporting documents evidencing the success of the information gathering," Camora said.

"As far as the documents that they have submitted, we are not, so far, we are not satisfied with the documents they have submitted. So, we ask them to submit the documents that would satisfy the joint circular," she added.

“As to the provision of food and medical items, again, we asked them for an explanation since by themselves, food and medical aid appeared to not fall under the expenses allowed by the joint circular," Camora said. 

"So we are asking for an explanation of those items. And then, it's the same with traveling expenses,” she added.

The OVP in 2023 was allocated P375 million for the first three quarters of 2023—P125 million for each of the first, second, and third.

For the first quarter, P67 million was questioned in an AOM; for the second, P62 million; and for the third, P35 million.

The questioned expenses were those on the payments of reward, provision for medical and food aid, and payment of incentives or traveling relative to the confidential operations.

Duterte attended the hearing but opted to skip taking her oath during the proceedings. 

She asked that she be allowed to leave after Nueva Ecija Rep. Michaela Suansing's questions on COA's AOMs.

.Manila Rep. Joel Chua, the chairman of the committee, allowed the Vice President to leave, saying she did not take her oath anyway.

GMA News Online has sought comment from the OVP regarding its confidential fund spending in 2023 and will publish its reply when it is available

“Pwede naman po considering na hindi naman din po kayo naka-oath and alam naman po namin, marami rin po kayong ginagawa. The Vice President is excused. Thank you,” Chua said.

(You may go considering you didn't take your oath and you have other things to do. The Vice President is excused. Thank you.)

1-Rider Party-list Representative Rodge Gutierrez, in a separate interview, said COA’s action to question the OVP’s use of confidential funds for three straight quarters of 2023 following a notice of disallowance on OVP’s use of P73 million confidential funds in 2022 showed "a repeated pattern of fund mismanagement."

"The basis was laid out properly, and it's unfortunate that we did not have the proper resource persons... However, we were still able to ask the proper questions with COA. Although this is an initial inquiry, it’s very telling,” Gutierrez said.

"The OVP’s confidential fund use for 2023 reflects the same deficiencies as those highlighted in the 2022 report, indicating a troubling lack of accountability and transparency in handling these funds," he added,

"When the same justifications are presented year after year for millions of pesos in taxpayer money, it raises serious questions about whether these funds are truly being used as intended or merely being spent without proper oversight,” Gutierrez said. —NB, GMA Integrated News