Sara Duterte impeachment trial Day 15: Confidential ops not part of VP Sara mandate

State auditor Xylene del Campo on Wednesday maintained that the Office of the Vice President’s (OVP) 2023 confidential fund spending was irregular, saying supplier details were not confidential and that receipts or invoices should have been submitted to prove purchases made using the funds.

“Irregular po ‘yung paggamit nila kasi po hindi po ito compliant sa Joint Circular,” Del Campo said.

(It is irregular because the usage is not compliant with the Joint Circular.)

“‘Yung sa payment of rewards were not supported with documents evidencing success, and ‘yun nga po hindi nila na-provide ‘yung additional documents necessary para ma-ascertain ‘yung purchase of supplies and medical and food aid, at saka meron po meron din kaming naging finding sa reimbursement,” she added.

(The payment of rewards was not supported by documents evidencing success, and they did not provide the additional documents necessary to ascertain the purchase of supplies, medical, and food aid. We also had a finding regarding the reimbursement.)

Del Campo of the Commission on Audit’s Intelligence and Confidential Funds Audit Office also said that she cannot say whether the recipients of P375 million in confidential funds under Vice President Duterte's office who had apparent "funny" names are real persons or not.

Defense counsel Kristine Ferrer pressed Del Campo during the cross examination if her statement means that the funny names are not fake identities, to which Del Campo replied, “Hindi po ako makakasagot sa ganun.”

(I cannot answer that question po.)

Likewise, Del Campo testified that the conduct of confidential operations is not part of the mandate of the Office of the Vice President or the secretary of the Department of Education (DepEd).

Further, Del Campo said that the tree planting, Christmas parties, and other granting of social services which the OVP conducted ahead of the day it received its 2022 confidential funds in December 21, 2022 cannot be used to liquidate the said confidential fund because confidential allocation cannot be used for reimbursement as stated under the Joint Circular 2015-01 governing the use of confidential and intelligence funds.

Del Campo also told the Senate court that the OVP used part of its P375 million 2023 confidential fund allocation to reimburse its surveillance expenses, which cannot be paid for by confidential funds.

“In the ND of 2023, it states that [using confidential funds for] reimbursement is also not compliant with the Joint Circular. There are documents that were submitted but after the evaluation of each document, it is still not compliant with the Joint Circular,” Del Campo said, referring to notice of disallowance.

An ND is issued by the state auditors to an agency when an expenditure is “either irregular, unnecessary, excessive, extravagant, or unconscionable" and orders the concerns agency to return such amount to government coffers.

The House prosecution team, for its part, said it is hopeful that the Senate impeachment court will continue to apply liberality when it comes to parties making comments about the ongoing impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte.

House prosecution team trial spokesperson and Benjamin Tolosa, Jr. made the response after Senate impeachment court Presiding Officer Francis "Chiz" Escudero warned that the court will not tolerate violations of the sub judice rule or discussing the merits of the case while the trial is still ongoing, saying that one side “has been crossing the line many, many times.”

Defense

Vice President Duterte’s defense team questioned COA’s submission of audit documents concerning the OVP confidential funds to the House good government and public accountability panel which conducted inquiry on the OVP and Department of Education’s (DepEd) budget use.

Defense counsel Ferrer said that under Joint Circular No. 2015-01, liquidation documents submitted by agencies must only be examined by the COA-ICFAO.

Del Campo explained that the documents were submitted by the COA in compliance with the subpoena or the order to submit those documents issued by the said House panel.

Vice President Duterte’s lead counsel Sheila Sison on Wednesday also condemned a social media post made by private prosecutor Amando Ligutan regarding misleading questions while the impeachment trial was ongoing.

Ligutan’s Facebook post read: “A principle all lawyers and law students know by heart: Misleading questions are not allowed even on cross-examination.”

Ligutan did not mention names, but he made the comments after defense counsel Ferrer, during an argument with private prosecutor Lorna Kapunan, insisted that misleading questions are allowed during her cross-examination of the prosecution witness Del Campo.

“This was “in bad taste” and was inappropriate to do against a fellow member of the Bar, Sison said of Ligutan’s actions.

Impeachment court

Senate impeachment court presiding officer Escudero called on private prosecutor Kapunan and defense counsel Ferrer to temper their words during the impeachment trial of Vice President Duterte, saying their apparent generational gap should not fuel tension in the proceedings.

This happened after Ferrer pressed Del Campo on whether an apprehension was necessary to establish that information provided by an informant had yielded results before a reward could be paid.

Del Campo sought to explain that the requirements for the payment of rewards and the purchase of information are different by citing that Section 4.8.5 of the Joint Circular governing the use of confidential and intelligence fund, which reads “payments of rewards to informers should be supported with documents evidencing the success of the information gathering and/or surveillance activities on account of the information given by the informer.”

Ferrer then pressed for a categorical answer from Del Campo, prompting Kapunan to counter by saying misleading questions are not allowed during cross-examination.

Ferrer then countered, “They are allowed.”

This prompted Escudero to intervene, saying that “the generational gap: Counsels, please, let's not allow the generational or seeming generational divide to increase the tension in the courtroom. Let's keep it a notch lower.”

Later in the day, the Senate impeachment court issued new subpoenas to two former special disbursing officers (SDO) from agencies led by Vice President Duterte to testify at her impeachment trial within August 17 to 19.

Escudero made the announcement since the previous subpoenas—to former Office of the Vice President (OVP) SDO Gina Acosta and Edward Fajarda, who was SDO at the Department of Education when Duterte was Education secretary—only covered trial dates from August 10 to 12.—LDF, GMA News