Using confidential funds, the Office of the Vice President (OVP) paid its informants and agents in cash, which they used to purchase food, medicines, chairs, and other supplies.
OVP Assistant Secretary Lemuel Ortonio disclosed this to the Senate impeachment court on Tuesday, in response to the absence of official receipts for the office’s multimillion-peso confidential funds.
“The explanation provided to me is that the money was given directly to the informants and agents, and they were the ones who purchased medical and food supplies,” Ortonio told private prosecutor Mae Divinagracia.
“There are no official receipts (ORs), but there are acknowledgment receipts (ARs) that were provided,” he said. The ARs, he added, are “proof of the release of funds to the informants and agents.”
The Commission on Audit (COA) had issued an audit observation memorandum, notice of suspension, and notice of disallowance to the OVP for discrepancies in backing up the ₱500 million in confidential funds it spent from December 2022 to the first three quarters of 2023.
House prosecutors presented the COA findings before the impeachment court as evidence on their allegations that Vice President Sara Duterte misused her confidential funds, which were one of the four impeachable offenses against her.
They presented Ortonio, who accompanied the previous witness, Gina Acosta, former special disbursing officer of the OVP, in encashing the ₱500 million. The amount was withdrawn from the bank in four tranches of ₱125 million each.
More importantly, Ortonio was also among the signatories of the OVP responses to the COA notices.
“All the responses to the COA were signed by this witness, who had earlier said he had no personal knowledge,” Divinagracia said of Ortonio before she began her direct examination.
Another hostile witness
Like Acosta, the impeachment court declared Ortonio, who also serves as assistant chief of staff of Duterte, a hostile witness.
Ortonio repeatedly told Divinagracia that he had “no personal knowledge” of the physical and financial plan outlining the OVP confidential activities and operations.
He testified that he had not reviewed the ARs submitted as attachments to COA. This was also the case in the OVP’s liquidation reports that he “physically” saw but did not review.
Like Acosta, he said Col. Raymund Lachica, the former commanding officer of Duterte’s Vice President Security and Protection Group and designated as a security officer, could better explain the OVP’s implementation of its confidential activities and operations.
Acosta had earlier told the impeachment court that she entrusted the ₱500 million in OVP confidential funds to Lachica because he was the expert at implementing confidential activities and because the Vice President had designated him as security officer.
When the court’s presiding officer Francis Escudero asked Ortonio about the absence of ORs in the OVP purchases of food, medical, and other supplies, he replied in the affirmative, adding that “this was based on information of the security officer.”
He told Escudero that he had not seen a single AR.
Divinagracia asked whether Duterte instructed him to accompany Acosta to encash the four LandBank checks. The witness said Acosta had requested him to come along and that he did not know whether Acosta reported this to the Vice President.
Ortonio said he had no personal knowledge or that Lachica would know when Divinagracia asked him of “any threats that are of cataclysmic proportion” against Duterte when he requested confidential funds for the OVP in 2022.
Duterte request
He acknowledged that Duterte requested an initial ₱250 million from the Department of Budget and Management (DBM), but it granted ₱125 million.
He conceded that the OVP requested the confidential funds on Aug. 22, 2022, because the office under Duterte’s predecessor, Leni Robredo, had no such funds based on the records.
In her statement before Ortonio took the witness stand, Divinagracia said 473 police and military personnel secured Duterte, and that “no other vice president in our history” had such security.
The confidential funds “answered to no legitimate confidential purpose,” she said. “The amount was requested before the supporting plan was produced, and that the 2023 plan just repeated the operative language of the 2022 plan.”
Divinagracia showed a Nov. 30, 2024 letter of the OVP to the COA denying that the 2022 confidential funds were spent in 11 days, from Dec. 21–31, 2022. She pointed to his explanation in the letter that “a cash advance was drawn to facilitate payment for obligations already incurred.”
The private prosecutor cited a provision in COA Joint Circular No. 2015-01, which governs the guidelines on how confidential and intelligence funds are used and spent, regarding the proper use of cash advances.
“Cash advances shall be used for specific legal purposes related to confidential and/or intelligence funds. Under no circumstances shall it be used for liquidation of the previous cash advance or be transferred from one accountable to another,” the provision said.
Pressing on this matter, Escudero asked Ortonio what the phrase “to facilitate payment for the obligations already incurred” meant, saying it sounded like there was already something to pay.
‘Incurred’ obligations
“Sir, based on what was shared with me, these are not obligations, but arrangements have been done on activities that will be done, and then the payment will be made once the money is available,” Ortonio said.
Asked to elaborate on what he meant by “obligations already incurred,” the witness said: “What I meant by this statement is that there are already arrangements that have been coordinated prior to the release of the funds.”
But Escudero said that “obligations already incurred” meant having an obligation.
Ortonio also conceded no allotment supporting an OVP obligation for confidential funds was made during the last three months of 2022.
Divinagracia raised the ₱150,000 discrepancy the COA had earlier flagged, which is the excess amount the OVP liquidated for the Dec. 21–31, 2022 period. The OVP liquidated ₱125,150,000 when its cash advance was only ₱125 million.
Acosta, the former special disbursing officer, had earlier testified that shortly after handing over ₱125 million to Lachica, he called her to say he needed an additional ₱150,000 for a security operation. She said she called Ortonio at Lachica’s request and that he gave her ₱150,000, but that she did not know where he had sourced the money.
Personal funds
Ortonio told the impeachment court that he used his personal funds to cover the additional ₱150,000.
Divinagracia asked about Ortonio’s monthly pay, having a Salary Grade 29, and while defense lawyer Kristine Ferrer objected to this as being irrelevant, Escudero allowed the question.
Ortonio said his monthly gross pay is “roughly from ₱180,000 to ₱190,000.”
“Did you ask for a receipt to prove that you gave ₱150,000?” she asked Ortonio, who replied: “At that time, because of the urgency, and Miss Gina (Acosta) asked for help, I provided her with the request.”
When asked if his ₱150,000 was returned to him, Ortonio said: “Unfortunately, I was not reimbursed anymore.”
Escudero asked whether Ortonio had not been reimbursed until now, and he replied in the affirmative. He acknowledged that he had no record in the OVP of the ₱150,000 he gave to Lachica.
Ortonio conceded, on Escudero’s questioning, that Duterte knew about all the confidential funds—its release, encashment, spending, liquidation, and response to COA notices.
“Second, the Vice President authorized it based on her signatures in various documents, and third, this is under her supervision being the head of the agency?” the presiding officer said.
Ortonio said: “Based on my understanding and based on what I know, Sir, yes, the Vice President knows about the confidential activities and how it’s being implemented.”
Prosecutor’s remarks
When Divinagracia later asked Ortonio whether this meant “the whole confidential matter,” it showed that Duterte was the “architect and mastermind.” Ferrer objected, which Escudero sustained and struck off the descriptions from the record.
Likewise, the impeachment court struck off from the record the prosecutor’s earlier description of the use of the OVP confidential funds as a “scam.” She asked about the four different reasons the OVP used in justifying the confidential fund expenses.
“Will you also agree with me that the different reasons may mean that somebody is lying, or is it because it’s a scam?” she asked Ortonio, but Ferrer objected to this line.
The defense lawyer then asked the impeachment court to “remind the prosecution not to use inappropriate words like scam, mastermind.”
“This is a solemn proceeding; this is a court of law. This is a court of procedure and actually a court of decorum. We’re not supposed to make insinuations, accusations, or conclusions,” Ferrer said.
Escudero said he agrees and acknowledged that “it seems it’s becoming a habit rather than a pattern for the panel of prosecutors to close direct [examination] with such strong statements.”
Divinagracia apologized on behalf of the prosecution. “Sometimes,” she said, “we get carried away by our zeal and passion.”
“But we at the prosecution, we just want to call a spade a spade,” she added.
Escudero replied, “Within limits, you may.”
She said that like a fellow prosecutor, in apparent reference to private prosecutor Lorna Kapunan, who had tangled with defense lawyers too, told the court earlier, “Henceforth, we will try to behave.” CS
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