SDOs Face Senate Oath on Cash Handed to VP Security

Special Disbursing Officers Gina Acosta and Edward Fajarda are expected to take the stand in the Senate Impeachment Court to recount how they encashed hundreds of millions in confidential funds and handed the cash to security officers. House lead prosecutor Gerville Luistro said their appearance will follow the current Commission on Audit witnesses and House records. The funds under Article I total P612.5 million: P500 million for the Office of the Vice President and P112.5 million for the Department of Education while Sara Duterte headed both.

Both officials already gave sworn accounts to the House Committee on Good Government. Those statements now move into a full trial setting where they face cross-examination as unwilling or hostile witnesses. The shift from committee hearing to impeachment court raises the stakes on every detail they already placed on the record.

The Cash Path the SDOs Already Described

Acosta served as SDO for the OVP. She earlier told the House she encashed Treasury checks and turned the cash over to Col. Raymund Dante Lachica of the Vice Presidential Security and Protection Group. She said the handovers carried the approval of Vice President Sara Duterte.

Fajarda, then DepEd SDO, said he withdrew the cash and gave it to Col. Dennis Nolasco, a security officer. Fajarda stated he did not personally know the reported ultimate recipients and that Nolasco did.

1. December 2022 onward: Acosta handled four OVP checks of P125 million each, totaling P500 million, encashed at Land Bank branches.
2. February, April, July 2023: Fajarda handled three DepEd checks of P37.5 million each, totaling P112.5 million.
3. House hearings 2024: Both SDOs described the turnovers to the named colonels rather than direct personal disbursement by the SDO.
4. August 2026 trial window: Subpoenaed for Senate testimony expected around August 10-12 after COA auditor Xylene Mae Del Campo and legislative records.

Bank managers earlier told the court the large cash withdrawals were unusual. The SDOs’ prior narratives place the physical cash with security personnel immediately after encashment. That sequence leaves little time between the bank counter and the first non-SDO hands in the chain.

The two paths share a common shape even though the agencies and amounts differ. Cash left the Treasury system as checks, became physical currency at Land Bank, and moved at once to named security officers rather than remaining under the SDO’s direct personal custody for later, documented outlays.

Rules That Bind the Head of Agency First

Private prosecutor Benjamin Tolosa Jr. reminded the court that accountability does not end with the SDOs. Under the Government Auditing Code, the head of an agency is primarily responsible for government funds and property. Personnel who hold custody remain accountable to that head, without prejudice to either party’s separate liability.

The governing framework is the 2015 joint circular on confidential and intelligence funds, signed by COA, DBM, DILG, GCG and DND. It requires strong internal controls precisely because the funds are classified.

The head of agency may serve as SDO or designate one. Either way the head must approve cash advances, oversee use, maintain internal controls against irregular spending, approve liquidation reports, and ensure complete supporting documents reach COA’s Intelligence and Confidential Funds Audit Office.

• Approve the physical and financial plan that lists intended confidential activities.
• Institute controls that prevent unnecessary or extravagant outlays.
• Sign off on quarterly accomplishment reports sent to the President and congressional leaders.
• Ensure the accountant submits fully documented disbursement vouchers.

The SDO, in turn, draws the cash advance, keeps separate records, prepares liquidation reports for the head’s approval, and submits them to COA-ICFAO with evidence of payment. Cash advances are limited and must be liquidated within 30 days after the quarter or project end.

Allowable uses are narrow: purchase of information for national security or peace and order, safe-house costs, certain equipment that cannot go through normal procurement, rewards to informers backed by proof of success, and related operations. Food and medical assistance, salaries, representation and construction are barred.

Failure to liquidate on demand creates a prima facie presumption that the missing funds went to the accountable officer’s personal use. Former COA auditor Roderick Wamil has already told the Senate that Duterte, as head of both agencies, qualifies as an accountable officer under the circular.

The circular therefore stacks duties rather than splitting them. The SDO holds the cash and the daily record. The head still approves the plan, the advances, the liquidations and the reports that travel upward. Missing papers at the end of that chain pull both roles into the same presumption.

What COA Already Flagged on Liquidation

COA witnesses have described missing or deficient documents for large portions of the funds. Wamil testified that DepEd submitted no supporting papers for the full P112.5 million despite a physical and financial plan signed by Duterte that listed counter-insurgency, school abuse prevention, anti-illegal activities and anti-extremism work.

For the OVP, accomplishment reports listed medical and food assistance (P42 million in one quarter alone) and other items outside the allowable list. No receipts or success certifications for rewards accompanied the filings in the periods examined. Earlier findings questioned roughly P375 million in 2023 OVP outlays and P73 million from 2022 for unsupported or non-compliant spending.

• P112.5 million DepEd: zero supporting documents for the three quarterly releases.
• P42 million OVP first-quarter medical/food line: prohibited category, no evidence.
• P375 million OVP 2023 portion: documentary deficiencies and non-allowable uses.
• Signed vouchers: Wamil said the vice president personally approved utilization of irregularly disbursed portions totaling P375 million across three quarters.

Wamil also recounted a 2023 meeting in which OVP and DepEd staff, including chief of staff Zuleika Lopez and then-spokesman Michael Poa, asked auditors to issue a softer audit query instead of a formal Audit Observation Memorandum so the agencies could still supply papers. The prosecution treats the absence of required documents as triggering the personal-use presumption.

Taken together, the COA record shows two kinds of breakdown. One agency produced a plan and then no papers. The other produced papers that listed barred categories and still lacked the receipts and success certifications the circular demands for rewards.

Hostile Witnesses and the Risk of Changing Stories

Luistro said the prosecution expects Acosta and Fajarda to be unwilling or hostile because of their direct role in the transactions. Private prosecutor Amando Virgil Ligutan underlined the distinction: earlier witnesses were cooperative; these two are not.

We hope they will be consistent with their narratives because I will not understand if, after their clear narration of what happened during the hearing of the Committee on Good Government, they suddenly change their story.

Luistro made the remark at a press conference covered by Manila Standard. She added that both prior House testimony and any Senate testimony occur under oath. “Lying is prohibited because they are under oath, and they have to explain why what they are saying now contradicts their prior declarations.”

She cautioned against assuming a flip will occur. All that is required, she said, is that they tell the truth about what happened when the funds were disbursed and liquidated. “As Special Disbursing Officers, they are the ones who should know best what happened to these public funds.”

On X and in public commentary, observers noted the practical bind: if the SDOs stick to the House versions, the cash path to the colonels is locked in under trial oath. If they retreat, they must reconcile the contradiction while still under oath, and the earlier statements remain evidence.

Either outcome still advances the factual record. Consistency hardens the handover narrative. Contradiction forces an explanation that the court can weigh against the prior sworn accounts and the COA paper trail already in evidence.

Security Officers Sit in the Middle of the Chain

The House accounts of the cash turnovers to colonels place Lachica and Nolasco as the immediate recipients after the bank counters. Acosta said she acted on the vice president’s go-signal. Fajarda said Nolasco, designated as DepEd security officer, handled actual further disbursement.

That arrangement sits outside the circular’s picture of an SDO who keeps the funds under direct personal accountability, maintains the cash disbursement record, and personally liquidates. Handing large cash sums to non-SDO security personnel immediately after withdrawal raises questions the prosecution wants answered on the record: who actually paid whom, what documents traveled with the money, and how the final liquidation packages were assembled.

Older public tallies and witness threads have described further distribution points after the colonels. Those claims remain for the court to test. The SDOs themselves are positioned as the first links who can confirm or deny the initial handover under the stricter rules of impeachment procedure.

How the Two Agencies Differ on Paper

The OVP and DepEd tranches share the same circular and the same head of agency, yet the COA findings already on record describe different documentary failures. Side by side, those differences matter for how the Senate may weigh each portion of the P612.5 million.

• OVP path: four checks, P500 million, handovers to Col. Lachica with stated vice-presidential approval; accomplishment reports that included a P42 million medical and food line plus other items outside the allowable list; roughly P375 million in 2023 and P73 million from 2022 flagged for unsupported or non-compliant spending; signed vouchers that Wamil linked to personal approval of irregularly disbursed portions.
• DepEd path: three checks, P112.5 million, handovers to Col. Nolasco; a physical and financial plan signed by Duterte that listed counter-insurgency, school abuse prevention, anti-illegal activities and anti-extremism work; zero supporting documents submitted for the full amount across the three quarterly releases.

One path produced papers that the auditors say do not match the circular. The other produced a plan and then silence. Both still leave the head of agency inside the primary-responsibility frame Tolosa cited from the Government Auditing Code.

The SDOs’ coming testimony cannot erase those paper differences. It can only explain how cash moved from bank to colonel in each agency before the liquidation stage failed in its own way.

What Liquidation Deadlines Mean for the Case

The circular’s 30-day liquidation rule after quarter or project end is the mechanism that turns missing documents into a legal presumption. Once the deadline passes without complete papers, the burden shifts. Failure to liquidate on demand creates a prima facie case that the funds went to the accountable officer’s personal use.

Wamil’s testimony already places Duterte inside that accountable-officer definition for both agencies. The prosecution does not need the SDOs to prove the circular’s text. It needs them to fix the factual chain of custody so the court can apply that text to named people and dated withdrawals.

The 2023 meeting Wamil described, where staff sought a softer audit query instead of a formal Audit Observation Memorandum, shows the agencies understood papers were still missing while time remained to supply them. The later COA findings indicate those papers did not arrive in the form the circular requires.

Against that backdrop, Acosta and Fajarda become the witnesses who can say whether the cash ever stayed long enough under SDO control for ordinary liquidation practice to operate, or whether it left their hands at the first handover to security officers.

Why the Prosecution Still Needs Their Voices

Even a hostile SDO who accepts personal responsibility does not erase the agency head’s primary duty. Tolosa’s point on the auditing code is structural: custody personnel answer to the head; the head answers for the funds.

Luistro framed the SDOs as key fact witnesses precisely because they handled the money. Consistency with the House record would place the cash physically with security officers named by the SDOs and approved, in Acosta’s account, by the vice president. Inconsistency would force an on-the-record explanation of the earlier sworn statements.

The circular’s rules responsibilities and penalties under the circular already supply the legal consequences for missing liquidations and non-allowable uses. The SDOs’ testimony is expected to supply the factual chain of who touched the cash after it left the bank.

Public discussion has already surfaced the counter-argument that the SDO, not the agency head, is the accountable officer because the SDO is the payee and holds custody. Wamil and the circular text reject a clean separation: the head approves, oversees, certifies and remains responsible. That tension is what the Senate will hear when Acosta and Fajarda sit.

Their appearance is the next scheduled step after Del Campo and the House records close. The court will then have both the paper trail COA found deficient and the living accounts of the two officers who withdrew the checks.