Duterte’s daughter’s sense of entitlement

Have you also read the FB post “Sara’s secret use of DepEd money” by Diego Mora?

“There is something unique in the way Sara Zimmerman Duterte Carpio spends public money. She just disburses cash without properly liquidating funds placed under her prudent custody.

“This happened when she secured a total of P221.424 million from the Contingent Fund (CF) of the Office of the President (OP) in December 2022 for the use of the Office of the Vice President (OVP.)

“The Department of Education (DepEd) also does not know where the P112.5 million of the 2023 Confidential Intelligence Fund (CIF) of the department went.

“On Sept. 2, 2024, DepEd Undersecretary for Finance Annalyn Sevilla testified and admitted that the money, released quarterly, was supposedly liquidated by Sara as DepEd head then but only a cover letter for the liquidation is on file with her office.

“For the 2022 P221.424-million the OVP spent, the Commission on Audit (COA) issued a notice of disallowance (ND) and ordered the return of P69-million of the P73 million for “non-submission of documents evidencing the success of information gathering and/or surveillance activities to support the acknowledgment receipts for payments of rewards in cash, various goods, and medicines.”

“COA was surprised to learn that P10 million of the money went to payment of rewards, P34.857 million for yet another payment of reward comprised of “various goods” and still another P24.93 million for payment of reward in the form of “medicines.” COA said that P3.5 million of the disallowed P73 million was used to pay for “tables/chairs/desktop computers/ printers without specifying that they were intended for the confidential operations/activities undertaken by the OVP.”

“Technically, Sara cannot invoke the argument that the money extended to her was CIF since the OVP was not entitled - the OVP budget for 2022 has zero provision for CIF.

“Why the clumsy reporting for the supposed “rewards” dispensed by Sara for the shadowy figures covered by her imaginary CIF? The answer is simple.

“It has been Duterte culture to play around with the CIF in Davao City, which appropriated billions of pesos from 2016 to 2022, beating the CIFs of Makati/Quezon City/Manila/Cebu, which are wealthier jurisdictions with bigger revenues than Davao City.

“It is strange how reward money can now be fungible, and millions have been likewise paid out for 132 OVP surveillance operations which are supposed to be covered by Sara’s security detail, which has a separate budget from the Presidential Security Group (PSG.)

“Sara now has “her own command,” a sub-unit for her 433 bodyguards, minus the 75 cops that the Philippine National Police (PNP) reassigned. Sara is not their boss but she insists she is, and wants the Davao City cops who have served her well should always belong to her stable.

“Fortunately for the Republic, Sara was not designated as secretary of the Department of National Defense (DND), which could provide her with a security detail, say a battalion each, from the Philippine Army/Philippine Navy (PN)/Philippine Air Force (even) the Philippine Marine Corps (PMC) of the PN.

“By presiding over the unwieldy spending at OVP and the strange disbursements at DepEd, it is crystal clear that Sara cannot be entrusted with enormous responsibilities that require honesty and sincerity, particularly as regards money.

“Which brings us to the question of why she must stick to her post at the people’s sufferance when it has become more than evident that she neither has the intellectual delicacy or moral rectitude required of her office.

“By fiddling with people’s money and spending it penny-wise and pound-foolish, Sara has impeached herself.

“She has become the Philippine version of Peter Principle, when those deemed to be extraordinarily incompetent end up completely incompetent as they rise in the hierarchy. The Dutertes are a prime dynastic example of that management perfidy.”