Sara refutes claim of OVP redundancy

MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Sara Duterte is challenging concerns about the supposed duplication of the Office of the Vice President (OVP)’s programs with that of national government agencies, saying no government agency “has a monopoly of government services.”

“No office of the government should be so helpless as to deny assistance to a person in distress. After all, the duty of the government is to afford our countrymen with faithful public service,” Duterte said in a statement over the weekend.

The Vice President issued the statement weeks after her clash with Sen. Risa Hontiveros over the OVP’s budget during a Senate hearing for the office’s proposed 2025 budget.

Hontiveros questioned how most of Duterte’s projects at the OVP are redundant, considering how most of her social assistance programs are already available from other government agencies.

The OVP is proposing a P2.037-billion budget for 2025, the lion’s share of which would be allocated to its socio-economic programs such as medical, burial, livelihood, disaster, school supplies and educational assistance, among others.

In her appearances at the budget hearings before the Senate and the House of Representatives, Duterte took a hostile approach toward questions about how the OVP spent its funds the previous years.

The Vice President accused both chambers of playing politics by questioning how the OVP and the Department of Education’s budgets, particularly their confidential funds, were spent the past two years.

At a House appropriations committee hearing last week, it was revealed that the Commission on Audit issued a notice of disallowance on P73 million of the P125-million OVP confidential funds in 2022, which was spent within 11 days.