A ranking Office of the Vice President official testified Tuesday that money he personally spent to cover pressing confidential fund charges was never returned to him, telling the Senate impeachment court he had absorbed a P150,000 loss.
The account came from OVP Assistant Secretary Lemuel Ortonio, who took the stand as the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte reached its 18th day. Ortonio had earlier been declared the prosecution’s second hostile witness, a designation that let House lawyers put leading questions to him during direct examination.
Much of the questioning turned on a P150,000 gap that the Commission on Audit had picked up in the OVP’s records. According to figures traced by private prosecutor Mae Divinagracia, the office’s accomplishment report listed P125 million, but the itemized rundown of spending came to P125.15 million — a mismatch the auditors flagged in a suspension notice.
Ortonio’s written answers to the commission shifted over the course of nine days. His first reply, dated March 13, 2024, attributed the gap to receipts that “may have been inadvertently mixed.” He followed that with a supplemental filing offering a different account: P50,000 tied to rewards for purchased information and another P100,000 for supplies had come out of his own funds rather than the office’s.
He traced the arrangement to a request relayed through then-OVP special disbursing officer Gina Acosta, who he said told him the money was needed quickly and that it had been sought by Col. Raymund Dante Lachica — at the time the head of the vice president’s security detail.
“At the time, because of the urgency and dahil humingi ng tulong si Ms. Gina sa akin, I provided her with the request,” Ortonio said.
Pressed on whether officials at the OVP routinely put up their own cash this way, he was direct: “No, it’s not common.”
The witness confirmed that his monthly pay ran between roughly P180,000 and P190,000 gross, consistent with his Salary Grade 29 rank as an assistant secretary. He also acknowledged that no receipt was issued when he handed over the money, again pointing to how quickly the expenses had to be settled.
Divinagracia’s line of questioning had sought to show that the OVP’s confidential funds served no legitimate confidential purpose — a framing the defense contested as drawing conclusions the court had yet to establish.
