Marcos' office logs 100% disbursement of P4.5-B confi, intel funds for 2024

The Malacañang office of President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. has utilized 100% of its P4.5-billion confidential and intelligence fund (CIF) allocation for 2024, its budget sponsor told other congressmen on Wednesday night.

The Office of the President (OP), through Bataan Rep. Albert Garcia, reported the matter during the questioning of House Deputy Minority Leader and ACT Teachers party-list Rep. Antonio Tinio.

Garcia said the OP spent P562.5 million of confidential funds every quarter in 2024. The quarterly intelligence fund spending for the same year, on the other hand, reached P600 million.

In total, these make OP's quarterly CIF spending last year at over P1 billion pesos.

"These are spent over the quarter or per three months, and undergo COA (Commission on Audit) process. These are withdrawn in cash per quarter, to be used for 90 days and subsequently liquidated," Garcia said.

"It was used by the national AML/CFT (anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism), Philippine Center on Transnational Crime, Presidential Commission on Visiting Forces Agreement, the National Coast Watch System, the Presidential Situation Room, the National Cybersecurity Interagency Committee, the People's Center on Transnational Crime, and the Anti-Terrorism Council Project Management Center," Garcia added.

Obligation vs. utilization rates

However, Tinio said spending over a billion for CIF in a quarter is questionable at the very least, given that these are cash expenses and the overall budget utilization of OP is just at 78.2%.

"This is P1.1 billion in cash [of CIF spent] per quarter. Every single peso is spent. But for its overall budget, OP was only able to obligate 78%. Why is it that if it is CIF, the disbursement rate is at 100%?" Tinio said.

In response, Garcia said that unlike the regular budget which is subject to stricter procurement and accounting laws, the use of CIF is covered by the 2015 Joint Memo Circular between various agencies.

In addition, Garcia said OP's use of CIF is all aboveboard.

"There are many other factors in disbursing the regular budget because it is distributed to personnel services, maintenance and operating expenses and capital outlay. Be that as it may, OP has obligated 78% of its overall budget. Of that 78%, 97% has already been disbursed which is already one of the highest disbursement rates among government agencies under the Executive department," Garcia said.

"Reports on CIF disbursement are submitted to the Speaker and the Senate President, and this is subject to the COA scrutiny. The OP did not receive any adverse findings from COA," Garcia added.

Regularity assumed

Tinio, however, said the existing joint memo circular on CIF disbursement is not enough since COA itself merely assumes regularity on the acknowledgement receipts and other documentation submitted by the agencies concerning their CIF use.

"COA does not even dig deep into it," Tinio said.

The 2015 joint circular defines confidential expenses as expenses pertaining/related to surveillance activities in civilian government agencies that are intended to support the mandate or operations of the agency.

Intelligence expenses, on the other hand, are defined as those related to intelligence information gathering activities of uniformed and military personnel and intelligence practitioners that have direct impact to national security. — VDV, GMA Integrated News