THE former special disbursing officer of Vice President Sara Duterte admitted on Monday that the Office of the Vice President (OVP) followed the same ‘standard operating procedure’ in handling confidential funds that was used in Davao City when Duterte was mayor.
Gina Acosta made the admission under questioning during the impeachment trial after Presiding Officer Sen. Francis Escudero asked her directly whether the practice was the same in both offices.
House of Representatives prosecution team counsel Amando Ligutan told the Senate impeachment court that Davao City was allocated P460 million in confidential funds annually from 2019 to 2022, or a total of P1.84 billion over four years.
Acosta, who served as SDO in Davao City before moving to the OVP, said she could no longer recall the amounts allocated to the city.
Ligutan later questioned Acosta about the procedure she followed in handling the OVP’s confidential funds, particularly the acknowledgement documents signed by Col. Raymund Dante Lachica, a regular Army officer and Philippine Military Academy graduate, when she released four P125-million cash tranches totaling P500 million to him.
Acosta testified that Lachica, who is due for mandatory retirement on September 22 this year, signed an internal document acknowledging each cash release but later took it back after submitting a fund utilization report and the funds were liquidated.
For his part, Escudero sought to clarify the procedure.
‘So it was no longer in your hands but in his hands?’ Escudero asked, referring to the acknowledgement document that Lachica signed for the first P125-million release.
‘It was no longer with me, Your Honor,’ Acosta replied.
Escudero asked whether the same process was followed for the three P125-million releases in 2023, with Lachica signing upon receiving the money and later retrieving the acknowledgement after submitting his fund utilization report, and the funds were liquidated before the Commission on Audit.
‘Yes, Your Honor,’ Acosta said.
Ligutan then turned to Acosta’s stint as SDO in Davao City and asked whether the same procedure was followed there.
Acosta initially said she could no longer recall. ‘I will have to recall, Your Honor, because that was a long time ago,’ she said.
Ligutan described the procedure as a ‘modus operandi,’ prompting an objection from the defense.
Escudero cautioned against the term and reformulated the question.
‘Counsel, we both know modus has a secondary and double meaning,’ Escudero said.
The presiding officer instead asked whether this was the standard operating procedure Acosta followed as SDO in both Davao City and the OVP.
‘Was this your usual practice and procedure when you were the SDO of Davao regarding the confidential funds and when you were the SDO of the OVP?’ Escudero asked.
He described the procedure as releasing confidential funds to a security officer or another person who was not bonded, having the recipient sign an acknowledgement document, and allowing the document to be taken back after a fund utilization report was submitted and the funds were liquidated before COA.
‘Yes, Your Honor,’ Acosta replied.
The admission established that Acosta followed the same procedure as SDO under Duterte in Davao City and later at the OVP.
In the OVP, Acosta testified that Lachica was not fidelity-bonded when she released four P125-million cash tranches totaling P500 million to him from December 2022 through the third quarter of 2023.
‘He was not bonded, Your Honor, but I remained the accountable officer, Your Honor. I am still the accountable person, Your Honor,’ Acosta said.
She said Duterte designated Lachica to implement the OVP’s confidential activities.
Acosta later admitted she had no personal knowledge of Lachica’s actual payments to the recipients listed in acknowledgement receipts and relied on him and the documents he supplied in accounting for the expenditures.
Unbonded
ACOSTA also admitted on Monday that she released P500 million in confidential funds to an unbonded security officer designated by Duterte, relying solely on documents he submitted to account for the expenditures.
Acosta confirmed that Lachica-the ground commander of the Vice Presidential Security and Protection Group-was not fidelity-bonded when she disbursed four P125-million cash tranches to him between December 2022 and the third quarter of 2023.
Under government auditing rules, both the head of agency and the special disbursing officer remain the primary accountable officers for confidential funds.
Acosta said she released the money to Lachica because Duterte had designated him to implement the OVP’s confidential activities.
‘That is correct, Your Honor, because he was our security officer designated by Vice President Sara Duterte to implement the confidential activities,’ she said.
House prosecution counsel Amando Virgil Ligutan established the timeline of the four P125-million releases. While Acosta acknowledged familiarity with Section 6.1.1 and Section 6.1.6 of Joint Circular 2015-01-which prohibit transferring confidential funds between accountable officers or agencies-she maintained that her actions constituted direct disbursements rather than transfers.