A LAWMAKER has criticized 158 alleged “bogus and spurious” receipts used to expedite liquidation papers for P23.8 million in confidential funds of the Office of the Vice President under Sara Duterte.
“So, what you’re saying is they (OVP) exceeded in their liquidation reports?” Rep. Joel Chua, panel chairman of the House of Representatives’ Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability, asked 1-Rider Party-list Rep. Rodge Gutierrez regarding the discovery of 158 documentation lapses.
“Your guess is as good as ours. It could also be that these ARs (acknowledgment receipts) were belatedly prepared,” Gutierrez said.
The 1Rider party-list congressman said the liquidation papers bear dates in December 2023, when no confidential funds had been released at that time.
In total, the OVP submitted 158 acknowledgment receipts to the COA, including several transactions.
“For 158 people to make the same mistake is that something that would be acceptable? Is that an acceptable margin of error for COA?” Gutierrez asked.
“These are clear red flags in relation to the ARs submitted by the OVP, and this is something that we should consider (legislating).”
Commission on Audit official Gloria Camora admitted to the House Committee that there were “inadvertence and typographical mistakes” made by OVP personnel and she confirmed that no CIF had been released in the third quarter of 2023.
“One of the findings under the COA notice of suspension is that some ARs were dated December 2023, and some were even undated. They (OVP) said they inadvertently contained clerical or typographical errors indicating 2023 instead of 2022.”
Despite this, Gutierrez was unconvinced and called the discovered ARs “spurious and bogus.”
“Didn’t you find it strange? Not really strange – it’s outright false for it to justify an expense for 2022 but the date is 2023,” the lawmaker said.
The lawmaker presented ARs dated December 2022, where confidential and intelligence funds were only disbursed a month later, or December 2022, where the OVP spent P125 million in just 11 days.
The ARs also have similar letters and the same color of ballpoint pen used in the same pattern.
They also reportedly have signatories of an “AAS” and “JOV” who received a total of P280,000 and P920,000 for “purchase of information” in December 2022.
There are a total of 776 ARs, 302 of which have “unreadable names” with five “repeated names.”
Vice President Sara Duterte has yet to respond to the lawmaker’s allegations.
