VP Sara stays in House chamber to support detained aide, defying security rules

OCCUPY HOUSE Vice President Sara Duterte is occupying the office of her brother, Davao City Rep. Paolo Duterte, after she was disallowed from staying with her chief of staff Zuleika Lopez (left photo) in the detention facility of the House of Representatives. —GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE/NIÑO JESUS ORBETA

Vice President Sara Duterte is disregarding House security rules by staying “indefinitely” in the chamber to support her detained top aide. This unusual action is expected to increase tensions between her and lawmakers.

On Friday, Duterte also resisted a House request for her to appear at a committee hearing regarding the Office of the Vice President’s confidential funds. She stated that she would only attend if there were concerns for the safety of OVP staff called by the lawmakers.

Several congressmen investigating the Vice President’s confidential funds likened her move to the action of a “brat” and suspected that she did not really want to comfort her chief of staff, Zuleika Lopez, but to make sure that the official would not make a full disclosure of her use of the secret funds.

Called out by Speaker

In a hastily called press conference via Zoom from the office of her brother, Davao Rep. Paolo Duterte at the Batasang Pambansa building in Quezon City, the Vice President said she faced mortal danger from the Speaker of the House.

She said she told the House sergeant-at-arms, retired police Maj. Gen. Napoleon Taas, that she didn’t need any extra security personnel as she had brought her own.

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“If anything happens to me here inside (the House), there is only one person who wants to kill me, and that’s (Speaker) Martin Romualdez,” she said.

But she added: “I don’t think he will do that here inside. He will do it outside.”

Romualdez on Thursday called out Duterte for sending her officials instead of herself to explain to lawmakers her use of P612.5 million in confidential funds of the OVP and the Department of Education when she was still the education secretary from 2022 to 2023.

“She should now appear, take the oath, speak and explain,” Romualdez told reporters in Butuan City on Thursday. “She shouldn’t let her officials at the OVP and DepEd handle (the explanations).

She should be the one to speak.”

Overnight stay

According to House officials, Duterte made the move to place herself inside the House on Thursday night, arriving at the Batasang Pambansa in Quezon City around 7:40 p.m. supposedly to visit Lopez, who was cited for contempt and ordered detained a day earlier.

Lopez, 50, who had twice served as Davao City administrator when Duterte was the city mayor, was cited for her “evasive” answers to a House inquiry into the Vice President’s use of confidential funds and for “undue interference” in the House’s oversight function by telling the Commission on Audit (COA) not to hand over audit reports on the funds to the committee looking into the spending of the OVP.

After detention visits ended at 10 p.m. on Thursday, Duterte refused to leave the House and locked herself inside the office of her brother, Davao Rep. Paolo Duterte, where she stayed overnight, according to Taas.

House Secretary General Reginald Velasco said that Duterte and her staff remained in her brother’s office and refused to leave even after they had shut down power, which the House normally does ahead of the long weekend as its offices are closed from Friday to Sunday.

In a statement on Friday, Senior Deputy Speaker Aurelio Gonzales Jr., Majority Leader Manuel Jose Dalipe and Deputy Speaker David Suarez denounced Duterte’s brazen disrespect of the chamber and her serious breach of security.

“No matter how many times she was asked by our House sergeant-at-arms to leave, she has ignored it,” they said. “If she does not have respect for simple rules, how can we trust that she is able to respect the bigger responsibilities she must do as an elected public official?”

Manila Rep. Joel Chua, who heads the House committee on good government and accountability investigating Duterte’s alleged misuse of confidential funds as Vice President when she was education secretary, said at a press conference that he had denied Duterte’s request to stay with Lopez inside the House detention facility.

Request denied

In a Nov. 21 letter to Chua, Vice President Duterte appealed on humanitarian grounds to stay with Lopez, expressing concern for her chief of staff’s health and well-being.

She listed down, among others, Lopez’s chronic back problems, nausea, lightheadedness, and fears for her safety.

Chua rejected her request, citing the strict rules of the Office of the Sergeant-at-Arms (Osaa) regarding detention, adding that the facility was exclusively for detainees.

But Duterte pressed on, stating in another letter on Friday her intent to visit Lopez daily “for the full period of her detention” according to the guidelines of the Osaa pertaining to persons under House custody.

During her Zoom press conference, Duterte was asked why she was evading the House probe. She replied that the House was imposing “unconstitutional” rules in its hearings and planned to legally challenge its investigation.

“They have no investigatorial, prosecutorial powers, and they must respect the rights of people appearing,” she said.

The Vice President said she was consulting her lawyers regarding the possibility of taking the legislators to court and that “they are ready” to file cases against House members.

Brother lets her stay

Her brother informed Chua in a letter that he had given her permission to “stay indefinitely in my office to discharge her day-to-day duties.”

“The Vice President’s stay will also correspond to her visits to (Lopez) and other OVP personnel currently detained,” he said, adding that she was “amenable” to staying there even without water and electricity.

The Vice President told reporters that she could stay in her brother’s office until New Year’s Day.

Chua, sounding exasperated, asked whether “we need to remind the Vice President to follow the law.”

“Our Vice President is a lawyer, she is the second-highest official of the land. We took an oath of service which stated that we will follow the rules of the land,” Chua said.

Play for sympathy

Other lawmakers also condemned Duterte’s actions which they said was an attempt to influence the proceedings against her and even curry public sympathy for her as she continued to dodge the hearings into her confidential fund use.

Zambales Rep. Jay Khonghun said he couldn’t help “but be suspicious of her motives of offering to join her chief of staff in detention,” saying that she might just want to stop Lopez from testifying once the committee resumes its inquiry on Monday.

“Or is this just for show, another attempt at heroics? … Is this the Duterte brand?” he asked. “Why is their behavior bereft of respect? Why act like a brat?”

ACT Teachers Rep. France Castro also questioned Duterte’s “selective appearance” at the House.

“If she has nothing to hide, why doesn’t she face us? Her continued absence from our hearings while finding time for other House visits only reinforces public doubt about the use of these funds,” she said.

Davao origins

Duterte attended a hearing called by the quad committee on Nov. 13 to show solidarity with her father, former President Rodrigo Duterte, whose brutal drug war was under investigation.

This time, she literally stayed in the House to show support for Lopez.

Lopez, a niece of former Mayor Elias Lopez, first entered the Davao City government service as city council secretary in 2007, when Duterte first ran and won as vice mayor in the city.

When Duterte won as mayor in 2010, she picked Lopez as her city administrator.

Lopez gained the reputation of a no-nonsense executive.

READ: House orders transfer of VP Duterte’s aide to women’s prison

Among her earliest directives was a dress code at City Hall, where people from the far-flung villages used to be at ease and were welcomed wearing only their slippers when the older Duterte was the city mayor.

In 2013, when her father again ran for mayor, Duterte withdrew from politics and went full time into her private legal practice.

She again picked Lopez as her city administrator when she won again as mayor and her father became President in 2016.

In 2022, after winning the vice presidency, she brought Lopez along with three other city officials to the OVP. —WITH A REPORT FROM GERMELINA LACORTE