MANILA, Philippines — House lawmakers are questioning the authenticity of at least 158 acknowledgment receipts submitted by the Office of the Vice President to the Commission on Audit to justify its confidential expenses, saying the "red flags" in the documents point to possible forgery.
On Tuesday, November 5, the House good government panel surfaced lawmakers' concerns about the same typographical error appearing in 158 receipts and the absence of signatures in documents used to liquidate the OVP's secret funds in 2022 and 2023.
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Confidential funds, as the name implies, are secret expenses that can only be audited through government agencies' submission of documents to the Commission on Audit (COA).
As past hearings by the House good government panel show, the OVP has primarily justified its confidential expenditures to the COA through submissions of acknowledgment receipts. These are supposedly signed by the people who receive the money, but the receipts themselves do not indicate details other than the amount disbursed and the name and signature of the receiver.
Based on his office's "study" of the OVP's receipts, Rep. Rodge Gutierrez (1-Rider Partylist) said he found it odd that 158 of these amounting to P23.8 million were incorrectly dated as being received in December 2023 instead of December 2022.
Gloria Camora, the leader of the COA unit that audited the OVP's confidential funds in 2023, said Vice President Sara Duterte's office had attributed these date discrepancies to "inadvertent clerical or typographical errors."
"We would understand if the typographical error happens once or twice, and for a single individual to make this mistake multiple times... [But] for 158 people to make the same mistake? Is that an acceptable margin of error?" Gutierrez said.
He added that the timing of the error coincided suspiciously with the COA's notice of suspension to the OVP in December 2023, which was when the OVP would have submitted its second batch of receipts to the state auditors.
Gutierrez raised the possibility of person(s) "belatedly preparing" the acknowledgment receipts that should have been created in 2022.
"I don't think this was a mistake that was committed in December 2022. This was a mistake committed after the fact. The audit observation memorandum and the notice of suspension, when they were rushing to comply with the gaps pointed out by COA," the lawmaker added.
The solon argued that if an acknowledgment receipted from December 2022 was truly mistakenly dated as December 2023, it would have made no sense since the OVP no longer disbursed its confidential funds in the fourth quarter of 2023.
Gutierrez argued that labeling these issues as "inadvertent errors" doesn’t hold up, especially given the frequency of the discrepancies: 158 times.
"More likely this was the same mistake committed by a few persons — which raises the question, are these ARs spurious, bogus and false?" he said.
Gutierrez also pointed out a particularly problematic receipt dated Nov. 27, 2022, which acknowledged P150,000 for "payment of reward (medicines)."
He noted that this predated the actual disbursement of confidential funds to the OVP, which COA confirmed occurred on Dec. 20, 2022.
Rep. Joel Chua (Manila, 2nd District), chairperson of the House good government panel, expressed surprise at the high number of errors. He similarly pointed out that the OVP did not have confidential funds in the fourth quarter of 2023.
"Parang lumalabas, lagpas yung kanilang liquidation. Sobra-sobra yung liquidation na nilabas nila. (“It seems their liquidation went beyond what was needed)," he said.
Camora confirmed that the November 2022 receipt pointed out by Gutierrez was among the many transactions that state auditors disallowed. A notice of disallowance from COA means the expenditure was inappropriately or incorrectly spent.
Gutierrez said these are "clear red flags" that emphasize the need for stronger regulations on the use of confidential funds and accountability for potential misuse.
Chiming in, Rep. Romeo Acop (Antipolo, 2nd District) said he drew from his investigator background and identified another red flag: at least 10 acknowledgment receipts signed by different individuals on different dates appearing to use identical ink.
"These acknowledgment receipts are under the names of different persons, but if you look at it, the signatures appear to be written with the same pen," Acop said in mixed English and Filipino, claiming the ink used was from Diamine Passion Blue.
Camora said it was "common" for agencies to use a blue or black pen. But Acop said it was still "highly irregular" that 10 receipts showed the same shade of ink despite being signed on different days by different persons.
Rep. Romeo Acop says he put his investigator cap on to identify the color of ink used to sign 10 of the OVP's acknowledgment receipts. He says it's irregular that the receipts were signed on different days, by different people, using the same pen. | via @chicristina_ pic.twitter.com/OLfpoW8IfZ
— Philstar.com (@PhilstarNews) November 5, 2024
Similarly, Gutierrez pointed out one December 2023 receipt submitted by the OVP that did not include a signature. "This is another case of an irregular AR, would that be correct?" he said. Camora answered in the affirmative.
"If we're doubting the authenticity of signatures, what more if there’s no signature at all? How do we know this person exists?" Gutierrez said, adding this is one of the many aspects of confidential fund use that should be addressed through legislation.
OVP officials and Duterte had once again snubbed the House good government panel's inquiry on Tuesday — its fourth overall.
Chua said the panel would be issuing a subpoena again with a "stern warning" to the absent OVP officials, one of whom had recently left the Philippines. He said this would be their last chance to appear before the panel before it moves to cite them in contempt.
Former OVP spokesperson Michael Poa was present during the inquiry. He confirmed that his contract was "pre-terminated" before the panel's third hearing last month. He said it was a mutual decision between him and Duterte.