Sara Duterte impeachment trial Day 17: Confidential funds disbursed to May Pamana, Pagong, Pusa

Former special disbursing officer (SDO) Gina Acosta returned to the witness stand on Monday, August 24, after two days of trial days cancellation last week due to heavy rains and flooding brought about by monsoon rains.

After saying last week that she has disbursed the P500 million worth of confidential fund of the Office of the Vice President (OVP) to OVP Security Officer Colonel Raymund Lachica on the orders of the Vice President Duterte, Acosta stated that Lachica is not a bonded or a non-accountable officer, meaning he does not have the mandate to account if confidential fund is lost since such duty belongs to an SDO.

Private prosecutor Amando Ligutan quizzed Acosta on unusual, if not funny, names who supposedly received the OVP’s confidential funds based on the acknowledgment receipts (ARs).

These names include:

• Antonio Pagong - P100,000
• Timon Andrew Pusa - P100,000
• May Pamana - P150,000
• Don Piang - P250,000
• May Pamana - P150,000
• Shane Ngitngit - P150,000 and
• Xuniso Belat - P100,000

Acosta, however, said she has no personal knowledge if the recipients of the confidential funds were indeed legitimate recipients or real people, and that Lachica took back the ARs he gave her.

Ligutan later pointed out that while the OVP conducted tree planting in the past using confidential funds, the OVP still managed to engage in a tree-planting activity in 2026 even if the OVP has no confidential funds.

Pressed by Ligutan and Senate impeachment court presiding officer Francis Escudero on whether she was hired as the OVP and Davao City's SDO during Duterte's tenure as mayor because she consistently followed the Vice President's instructions, Acosta said she has no idea why the Vice President tapped her as SDO.

“Hindi ko alam, Your Honor. Basta ginagawa ko lang ang trabaho ko na pagiging SDO,” Acosta said.

(I don't know, Your Honor. I am just doing my job as the SDO.)

The House prosecution panel also questioned Acosta’s apparent and sudden inability to recall details about how the confidential funds of Davao City were disbursed when Sara Duterte was mayor, given that Acosta easily answered the questions fielded in English by defense lawyer Lindon Bacquel.

Later in the day, the House prosecution team also flagged the meeting between its hostile witness Acosta and Bacquel, when Acosta went to Davao last week to visit her husband, who is ill.

Defense

Vice President Sara Duterte’s defense spokesperson Michael Poa on Monday denied reports that the vice president wants to speak with President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., supposedly to appeal to the President to allow her to run for President in 2028 in exchange for her resignation.

Poa dismissed the report as fake news when asked about the claim, during a break in the impeachment trial of Duterte.

“Fake news. Parang ’yung binato ako ng laptop o kung ano man, it’s also fake news. So, fake news po ’yan,” Poa said in an ambush interview with GMA News.

(Like the report that I was hit or struck with a laptop or something, that is also fake news. So, that is fake news.)

In addition, Poa said Acosta, who remains an OVP employee with a rank of Vice Presidential Staff 6, is not faking her incapacity to speak fluently in English or Filipino

“Perhaps hindi naman ‘yan strategy or evasiveness. It’s really her nature na mas komportable siya sa Bisaya, since Bisaya talaga siya,” Poa said.

(Perhaps, it's not a strategy or evasiveness. It's really her nature to be comfortable (speaking in) Bisaya since she is (from the) Visayas,)

He said Acosta had already expressed a preference for speaking Bisaya during the House proceedings, although she was encouraged at the time to answer in Tagalog and English.

Poa, however, said the defense has yet to decide whether it will call confessed confidential bagman and detainee Ramil Madriaga as a hostile witness, saying they would not want to telegraph their strategy.

Senator-judges

Senator-judge Risa Hontiveros confronted Acosta as to why an AR stated the name “Clarisse Hontiveros” as a recipient of OVP’s confidential fund and that the date of receipt was February 24, 2023 —coinciding with her birthday.

Acosta, however, said she was not aware that the date coincided with Hontiveros’ birthday and repeated that she only relied on Lachica’s accounts.

Senator-judge Lito Lapid also asked Acosta why his surname appeared on an acknowledgment receipt in the disbursement of the OVP's confidential funds in 2023.

“Nagpapasalamat po ako sa defense [team] at kay Lachica kung nabigyan ‘yung kamag-anak ko. Eh kung hindi, kung alias yun, paano ‘yung pangalan at apelyido namin na inalias niyo lang pala [at] hindi totoong tao?” Lapid said.

(I will thank the defense team if my relatives were indeed recipients of these. But if they are not and it was just an alias, what happens to our name, our surname that you used as an alias.)

Acosta did not give a clear answer to Lapid’s question, saying that the acknowledgment receipts bearing the Lapid name as one of the confidential fund recipients are all from Lachica, and that she merely relied on Lachica’s accounts.

Acosta somehow caught a reprieve from the grilling when she was asked by Senator Imee Marcos about the condition of her husband, whom Acosta said was badly ill in their hometown of Davao City.

“Hindi po maganda, Ma'am," she said.

But while she was given minutes to compose herself, Senator-judge Erwin Tulfo emerged unfazed and thereafter asked Acosta about the reported purchase of P122 million worth of medicines using confidential funds, particularly how the medicines were classified as rewards for informants.

“I’m wondering, how can medicines be considered a reward for an informant?” Tulfo said, questioning how medicines could be considered rewards for informants involved in surveillance activities.

Acosta kept on repeating the same lines in her response to senator-judges' questions: that she could not explain the transactions because she was not the person who implemented the activities on the ground.

As for other hostile witnesses for the prosecution, Senate impeachment court presiding officer Francis Escudero announced that former Department of Education SDO Edward Fajarda had requested to be excused from this week’s trial after reportedly suffering a stroke.

The impeachment court previously issued a subpoena to Fajarda to testify on Article 1 of the Articles of Impeachment, which pertains to the alleged misuse of P612.5 million in confidential funds by Duterte—P500 million from the OVP and P112.5 million from the DepEd.

Before acting on Fajarda’s request, Escudero directed the head of the Senate Medical and Dental Bureau to examine the prospective witness, validate the medical findings with his physicians, and submit a report on the matter.

Thereafter, the Senate impeachment court ordered one former and two incumbent military officers to testify before the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte.

Lead prosecutor Gerville Luistro said Colonel Manaros Boransing II (retired), Colonel Magtangol Panopio, and Major General Adonis Bajao are expected to testify on Wednesday, August 26, concerning the DepEd's disbursement of its 2023 confidential fund allocation.

“This is prompted by the inability of the next hostile witness, in the person of Edward Fajarda, to make himself available tomorrow and on Wednesday,” Luistro said, referring to Fajarda, who reportedly suffered a stroke.

During a House good government and public accountability inquiry on the OVP and DepEd budget in October 2024, Poa told lawmakers that he asked then Undersecretary and retired Major General Nolasco Mempin to seek certifications from a military unit for the liquidation of the P15 million confidential funds that the DepEd spent for informants in 2023.

At that time, Duterte was a concurrent Education Secretary.

But Boransing, Panopio and Bajao told the same House hearing that while it was their signatures that Mempin sought for certifications, they all insisted that they did not know that Mempin would use them to liquidate the DepEd’s P15 million confidential fund expenditures for informants. —LDF, GMA News