The House of Representatives has voted to slash the Office of the Vice President’s P889-million budget for 2026 by P156 million, making good on a promise to exact consequences for Vice President Sara Duterte’s repeated refusal to answer for her budget.
On Friday, Mamamayang Liberal Rep. Leila de Lima moved to bring back the OVP budget to its 2025 level at P733 million during the second reading for House Bill No. 4058, the chamber’s version of the national budget bill.
This after Duterte repeatedly snubbed the plenary deliberations for her office’s budget, even imposing conditions on the House if the chamber wanted her to personally defend her proposal.
‘The vice president’s repeated refusal to face this chamber is an insult and spits on the duty of accountability,’ De Lima said. ‘It’s as if we’re parents of a child throwing a tantrum while refusing to explain where they spent their allowance.’
‘Public money is not a toy. It is not a reward given to invented people with invented names in invented projects. It is a trust. And until the vice president learns respect, this House must act as the parent that disciplines a brat,’ she added.
House appropriations chair and Nueva Ecija Rep. Mikaela Suansing accepted the amendment while insisting that the current budget would still protect the interests of the OVP staff – referring to earlier, more radical proposals from the Makabayan bloc to reduce the OVP budget to only the barest minimum.
This is the second year in a row that the House moved to slash the OVP budget ever since she broke ties with President Marcos Jr.
In a better time, such as the start of the Marcos administration, she could propose a much higher budget-like the P2.3 billion she got in 2023.
But last year, the vice president was left with her current budget of P733 million after former House appropriations chair Elizaldy Co-who would soon be embroiled in the corruption scandal over flood-control projects-slashed the OVP’s budget by more than P1 billion for her refusal to explain how she spent her office’s confidential funds in 2022 and 2023. /apl