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Palace: Sara Duterte should’ve answered fund misuse claims earlier

Palace: Sara Duterte should’ve answered fund misuse claims earlier

Provided by INQUIRER.net.

Malacañang on Tuesday said Vice President Sara Duterte should have responded to allegations of her alleged misuse of confidential funds long before the issue reached impeachment proceedings.
Undersecretary Claire Castro and Vice President Sara Duterte. INQUIRER FILES



MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang on Tuesday said Vice President Sara Duterte should have responded to allegations of her alleged misuse of confidential funds long before the issue reached impeachment proceedings.

Presidential Communications Office Undersecretary Claire Castro made the remark in response to Duterte’s statement that she would only answer the allegations in the “proper forum.”

READ: 2 House lawmakers want to hold Sara Duterte accountable for fund misuse

“She should have done that a long time ago; the issue should have been resolved back then—starting with the COA—when an AOM [Audit Observation Memorandum] was first issued,” Castro said in a mix of Filipino and English during a Palace press conference.

“Before a Notice of Disallowance was issued, things should have been clearly explained. It wouldn’t have reached the point of impeachment proceedings if her explanation — and that of her staff — had been clear from the start. But it seems that from the accountant all the way to Atty. Zuleika Lopez, no one really knows how her confidential funds were spent,” she added mostly in Filipino.

Duterte, in a chance interview in Davao City, reiterated that she will only respond to allegations regarding her office’s supposed misuse of confidential funds — including the reported spending of P125 million in just 11 days — in the “proper forum.”



“If there is a case, we will explain in the proper forum. We already said, when they filed the articles of impeachment, that the defense team is ready to respond to the accusations from the House prosecutors,” Duterte said.

“When the case reached the Supreme Court, we complied with everything it asked for. In the proper forums and venues, we provide the appropriate responses and explanations to the accusations. But it can’t be a staged show or handled just anywhere without due process,” she added, mostly in Filipino.

Before the impeachment complaints were filed, Duterte was repeatedly given opportunities to explain her office’s use of confidential funds before the House of Representatives but consistently declined, including during the 2024 deliberations on her office’s proposed 2025 budget.

She also skipped a House inquiry into the alleged misuse of funds, calling it “unnecessary” and based on “unsubstantiated allegations.”



Duterte had vowed to address the allegations once her impeachment trial began, but the Senate archived the case following the Supreme Court’s ruling that the complaint was “unconstitutional.”

This has once again left the allegations against her unanswered. /jpv

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