Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 7) — A group of lawyers, constitutional experts, and economists filed a petition before the Supreme Court to declare the transfer of ₱125 million confidential funds to the Office of the Vice President (OVP) in 2022 as unconstitutional.
In its 49-page petition submitted on Tuesday, the group also asked the high court to order the OVP to return the money to the Treasury.
Former vice presidential spokesman and lawyer Barry Gutierrez, 1987 Constitution framer Christian Monsod, former Commission on Elections Commissioner Augusto Lagman, and former Department of Finance Undersecretary Cielo Magno were among the 11 petitioners. Ray Paolo Santiago, the Ateneo Human Rights Center executive director and also a petitioner, served as the lead counsel.
“The question of appropriation is important because these funds are the people’s money—and therefore, it is proper that the appropriation and use of the people’s money be properly accounted for,” the petitioners said.
In response, Vice President Sara Duterte said the OVP welcomes the chance to discuss the legality of the transfer of funds.
“Malugod po naming tinatanggap ang pagkakataong talakayin ang legalidad ng paglilipat ng pondo,” Duterte said in a video statement. “Umaasa kami na ang dunong ng Korte Suprema ay magiging daan upang tuluyang matapos ang usapin na ito.”
[Translation: We welcome the chance to discuss the legality of the fund transfer. We hope that the Supreme Court’s wisdom will lead us to the end of this issue.]
The petition
During the 2024 budget hearing of the Commission on Audit (COA) in August, ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. France Castro said Duterte spent ₱125 million in confidential funds in 2022 even if the OVP was not given an allocation for such funds under that year’s General Appropriations Act (GAA).
In filing a petition for certiorari, the petitioners argued that the controversial transfer was not a hypothetical situation and that it involved a transfer of funds from the Office of the President (OP) to the OVP to an inexistent item in the 2022 GAA.
“In clear violation of this intent by the Congress of the Philippines not to create an item on Confidential Expenses,” the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) released ₱221.42 million to the Office of the Vice President through a Special Allotment Release Order to cover Financial Assistance/Subsidy and Confidential Fund, as approved by OP on November 28, 2022, the petition said.
The released allotment includes ₱125 million “for an inexistent Confidential Fund,” as confirmed in audit reports published on the COA’s website, it added.
In September, the Office of the Executive Secretary (OES) said the release was “legal.” It said it was done through Special Provision No. 1 under the Contingent Fund in the 2022 GAA, which allows the president to approve releases to fund new or urgent activities of national government agencies.
The OES explained the request of Duterte’s office to the OP was ₱96.424 million for “maintenance operating and other expenses (MOOE) items such as Financial Assistance/Subsidy,” and ₱125 million in secret funds for “newly created satellite offices.”
RELATED: Quimbo: Nothing ‘improper’ about OP’s transfer of secret funds to OVP
DBM Secretary Amenah Pangandaman explained that the ₱125 million released — not transferred — to the OVP came from the ₱7 billion budget set aside as Contingent Fund for 2022, and was “intended to support the OVP’s Good Governance Engagements and Social Services Projects.”
But the petitioners asserted that the appropriation done by the DBM was a “clear usurpation of the legislative power of the Congress of the Philippines to create and fund an item that has not been done so by the Congress itself.”
They said “the confidential funds do not fall under the funding allowed by the contingent fund” written under the 2022 GAA special provisions.
“The creation of a confidential fund ‘for the safe implementation of the projects and activities under the Good Governance program’ could not be considered ‘new’ or ‘urgent’ that could not have been foreseen during the budget preparation,” they said, taking issue with the OVP’s letter sent to the DBM for the confidential fund request. “In fact, the Good Governance program of the respondent Office of the Vice President had already been allocated a specific budget under the GAA of 2022.”
The petitioners claimed that the transaction was to “avoid fiscal and audit scrutiny” and was “clearly unconstitutional.”
At the House plenary in September, Marikina Rep. Stella Quimbo, the budget sponsor of COA, said state auditors found that the OVP spent the ₱125 million confidential funds in 11 days, contrary to Castro’s earlier claim of 19 days. But the OVP maintained the amount was spent in a span of 19 days.
In defense of her office’s quick use of the confidential and intelligence funds, Duterte said ensuring the country’s peace and order should not be constrained by time.
The OVP and the DepEd were among the agencies given “zero confidential funds” under the 2024 General Appropriations Bill of the House of Representatives.
The bill has been transmitted to the Senate but the upper chamber has yet to tackle the proposed 2024 budget in its plenary.
