Lemuel Ortonio, Vice President Sara Duterte’s Assistant Chief of Staff, said the P150,000 excess in the Office of the Vice President’s liquidation of its P125 million in confidential funds for December 2022 came from his own pocket in response to an urgent request for funds coursed through special disbursing officer Gina Acosta.
Ortonio, who earns P180,000 to P190,000 a month as a Salary Grade 29 official, said he has not been reimbursed for the amount. He did not say why.
He also said his payment of the amount does not appear in the OVP’s records.
He earlier explained the source of the P150,000 to the Commission on Audit after it flagged the liquidation report on the P125 million confidential fund use, noting an excess of P150,000 and issuing a notice of suspension.
The OVP initially told the COA that the receipts may have been inadvertently mixed up.
But Ortonio wrote to the COA nine days later with a supplemental reply, where he said that P50,000 for a reward payment and P100,000 for the purchase of supplies came from his personal funds “due to the urgency of the expenses.”
Ortonio said the request for funds came from security officer Col. Raymund Lachica and was coursed through Acosta.
Private prosecutor Mae Divinagracia pointed out that since the money came from Ortonio, he should remember when he gave the money, and yet this was not mentioned in the OVP’s initial response to the COA’s notice of suspension.
“Nung gumagawa ka ng [reply sa] notice of suspension bigla mo nakalimutan na may P150,000,” Divinagracia said.
Ortonio said he submitted an initial reply because he had to confirm the matter first with the SDO.
Ortonio was summoned as a hostile witness in connection with allegations that Duterte’s confidential funds were misused.