The call to deny the Office of the Vice President (OVP) its budget for 2025 spread after Vice President Sara Duterte refused to answer questions related to her spending of confidential and intelligence funds (CIF) in 2022.

During six hours in front of House representatives on August 27, Duterte repeated her “refusal to defend” the budget she crafted for her office, and is “leaving” it to the Lower House to decide. At one point, she attacked ACT Teachers Party Rep. France Castro, one of the first to question the granting of the CIF last year. Because of this, Castro castigated for emuluating “squid behaviour” for squirting dark ink to hide the truth when being cornered.

Rep. Arlene Brosas of Gabriela Women’s Party said the inquiry related to CIF is related to transparency and accountability of all government officials.

Rep. Raoul Manuel of the Kabataan Partylist condemned Duterte for using the CIF for the Department of Education, which she previously led, to harass activists and suppress students’ right to express and organize. He also scrutinized the ₱10 million budget Duterte asked for the book “Ang Kaibigan”. Manuel said the book is peppered with mistakes and not suitable for children.

Mimi Doringo, Kadamay general secretary and Makabayan senatorial candidate, everything the vice president spews from her mouth is “garbage” because what she says are all worthless. “Sara Duterte just squandered time the same way she wasted ₱125 million confidential funds,” she said.

“Duterte’s CIF [spending] scandal reflects the cavalier attitude of politicians in handling the people’s money and their criminal sense of entitlement that they can divert these funds for their personal benefit,” Bayan said. This is a reminder of how Congress and officials of the Marcos Jr government colluded to allocate CIF to civilian agencies, it said.

“There is a need to scrutinize the increased CIF spending of the office of the president and even state security forces. Duterte, Marcos Jr, and all public officials should not be allowed to cite security matters when asked about suspicious spending of funds.”

National-democratic groups protested outside Congress to call for the abolition of all forms of pork barrel, including the office of the president, and the transfer of funds to social services.

Specifically, Bayan identified “presidential pork” worth ₱2 trillion, of which ₱10 billion is CIF, ₱156 billion is “unprogrammed funds,” and ₱1.89 trillion is “special purpose funds.” All this can wantonly be spent by Ferdinand Marcos. “These funds can be used by Marcos Jr for political patronage to consolidate power and dominate the 2025 elections,” the group said.