ACT Teachers party-list Rep. Antonio Tinio has accused Vice President Sara Duterte’s office and her supporters of using the Cebu earthquake to justify her absence during House of Representatives budget debates, claiming that she really had no intention of showing up.
Tinio, in an ambush interview on Tuesday, said that while it is true that Duterte was in Cebu for supposed relief operations after the Cebu earthquake, she was intent on evading the discussions as she laid down conditions for her appearance – conditions that the House cannot fulfill on its own.
Plenary debates on the Office of the Vice President (OVP) were originally scheduled for September 30, but discussions did not push through because Duterte did not send an undersecretary-level official to assist the budget sponsor. On the same night, northeastern Cebu was hit by a Magnitude 6.9 earthquake.
‘Her office and her supporters are spreading the narrative that she did not attend the budget hearing because she went to Cebu to give assistance to earthquake victims. That is true, she is in Cebu, but she really had no intention of showing up for OVP’s budget hearings because she laid down several conditions,’ Tinio told reporters in Filipino.
‘She said I will be there only, for example, if the Immigration look-out bulletin order against her staff involved in the issue of unexplained confidential fund usage will be lifted. So she is making it seem that there’s a valid reason not to attend debates here, she is using the earthquake in Cebu as a padding. But in actuality, she will not attend because she has raised conditions which are not up to Congress to fulfill,’ he added.
INQUIRER has asked the OVP for its response regarding Tinio’s allegations, but Duterte’s office has yet to respond as of posting time.
After not showing up on September 30 and October 1, the proposed OVP budget for 2026 was supposed to be tackled again on October 2, but Duterte was neither present nor did she send an undersecretary-level official to assist the budget sponsor and Palawan 2nd District Rep. Jose Alvarez.
Instead, Alvarez read three letters from Duterte – first, assigning staffers like Assistant Secretary Lemuel Ortonio and others to attend in her behalf; second, notifying the House committee on appropriations that Ortonio has been designated as officer-in-charge due to the leave of absence of Undersecretary Zuleika Lopez; and a set of demands for her appearance at the House plenary.
Part of Duterte’s demands is for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to also show up at the House to defend the Office of the President budget, and the lifting of Immigration lookout bulletin orders against her staffers.
This forced the House to move forward and end the period of sponsorship and debate on House Bill (HB) No. 4058, also known as the 2026 General Appropriations Bill (GAB), without addressing the OVP budget in the plenary.
Tinio said it is unusual for a sitting official to demand things before showing up and defending their agency’s proposed budget.
‘And in the first place, who does that, to put conditions first before approaching Congress to explain to the people how they intend to use their budget?’ he asked in Filipino.
After Duterte’s absence at the plenary debates, Tinio vowed to push for a significant reduction of the agency’s budget – from P902 million to just P198 million, or the OVP’s proposed personal services (PS).
PS is the allocation of an agency for its employees’ salaries.
Tinio, in his manifestation during Thursday’s session, said that Duterte’s insistence on not showing up or sending an undersecretary-level official to assist the budget sponsor is an indication that the OVP is not interested in defending their proposed allocation for 2026.
Mamamayang Liberal Party-list Rep. Leila de Lima said that because of Duterte’s actions, she initially thought of proposing to cut OVP’s budget to zero, but she said thinking of the employees prompted her to just push for a budget cut.
During the same interview earlier, de Lima said they may pick from the OVP’s Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) to include in the proposed budget – but they will be proposing an allocation that will not be equal to P902 million in the 2026 National Expenditures Program, or the P733 million in the approved 2025 General Appropriations Act.
‘We will pick from the MOOE. We will pick which among the items inside the MOOE can be retained,’ de Lima noted. /jpv