A House lawmaker defended the Commission on Audit’s decision affirming a notice of disallowance on P73 million in confidential funds disbursed by the Office of the Vice President in 2022, saying the findings were the product of a years-long audit process and not an act of political targeting.
House Committee on Public Accounts chairperson Terry Ridon, who also sits on the Committee on Justice, said the COA’s conclusions came after three years of audit, review, and validation — a timeline he argued disproves any claim of harassment.
“If this were political, it would have been rushed. Instead, it took three years. That is not harassment—that is due process,” Ridon said in a statement Friday.
“This did not happen overnight. These findings are the result of a three-year audit process conducted by the Commission on Audit, a constitutional body mandated to examine the use of public funds,” he added.
The COA’s Intelligence and Confidential Funds Audit Office confirmed at a Committee on Justice hearing Tuesday that the commission has affirmed the disallowance covering the OVP’s disbursement of the funds between December 21 and 31, 2022. Of the P73 million flagged, more than P69 million involved cash payments, products, and medicines given as rewards to informants — amounts the COA said lacked documentation establishing that information-gathering and surveillance operations had achieved results.
The OVP declined to address the disallowance, citing non-receipt of the formal COA decision. “The Office of the Vice President has not received a copy of the Commission on Audit decision presented at the House Committee on Justice hearing on April 14, 2026. Therefore, we cannot comment at this time,” the office told GMA News Online.
Ridon said the COA findings now carry direct relevance to the impeachment proceedings against Vice President Sara Duterte, though he was careful to draw a distinction between impeachment and a finding of guilt.
“This is about probable cause, not conviction. The purpose is to allow the evidence—including COA findings—to be examined in the proper forum,” he said.
